St. Paul, MN - Today, the Minnesota House of Representatives unanimously passed legislation authored by Rep. Dave Pinto (DFL-St. Paul), to clarify the age range for certain crimes involving children being sold for sex. The bill makes a technical upgrade to a 2021 law applying the most serious penalties to cases where the child is under 14 years of age instead of under 13.
"As a longtime prosecutor of crimes of gender violence, I'm proud to help complete the work that we started last session to ensure that the sexual exploitation of very young teens is treated as the deeply serious crime that it is," said Rep. Pinto.
The conforming change was recommended in the Minnesota Sentencing Guidelines Commission’s most recent Report to the Legislature. Rep Pinto’s bill eliminates confusion in investigating, prosecuting, and sentencing those who commit this crime.
Rep. Pinto was previously the Director of State Training and Protocol Development for Safe Harbor, Minnesota's system to address sex trafficking and sexual exploitation of young people. Outside of the Legislature, he serves as a felony prosecutor with a focus on crimes of domestic and sexual violence.
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