People v. Lam CA1/2

BACKGROUND

On December 18, 2014, a jury convicted Lam of possessing child pornography, in violation of Penal Code section 311.11(a). The conviction was based on evidence of 49 video files depicting child pornography found on several hard drives that had been seized during a police raid on his home. Lam’s defense, rejected by the jury, was that he had downloaded the material unintentionally, while batch downloading adult pornography. Thereafter, Lam was sentenced to 16 months in state prison and, among other things, ordered to pay $3,000 in victim restitution to “Vicky,” whom the prosecution identified post-trial as one of the children depicted in the pornography.

1 All statutory references are to the Penal Code.

1 The prosecution had been contacted by Vicky’s attorney, who was requesting restitution on her behalf after learning through a notification from the National Center for Missing Exploited Children and the USDOJ’s Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section that the video series exploiting Vicky as a child had been found in the defendant’s collection. The prosecution attached to its pleading requesting restitution a copy of the request from Vicky’s attorney along with its…