“Huh? The Mann act on steroids?”
The Mann Act requires an actual female vicitm, I believe. So these newer laws designed catch internet predators certainly seem broader.
“No requirement to cross those pesky state lines...”
The Mann Act is federal law, these newer laws are state laws.
“Apparently arranging a meeting for sex with a minor is A-OK, but driving to it isn’t?”
Actually showing up demonstrates intent more than internet chat does.
“Sooooo, if one of these miscreants arranged to have the tyke come to them, it would be legal?”
That does not follow at all. The existence of a law criminalizing one specific behavior does not impute, logically, either criminality or legality to other specific behaviors.
True. But I find this the moral equivalent of charging someone who shoots up a dance club with “discharging a firearm within city limits”.
Sorta misses the real crime, doesn’t it?
(OTOH, I bet it allows the cops to seize the car without due process, hold the car for extortionate towing and storage penalties and/or sell it at auction as a revenue source)...