the men with facilitating prostitution for having written stories about sex online.

Todd Maybrown, attorney for defendant Stephen Jenkins, sought further clarification from the county about what he described as the "novel" and "unprecedented" charge his client faces. The state claims that "each defendant is guilty of the felony offense simply because he became a member of the group that is known as The League," Maybrown wrote in an email, adding that he "has been unable to identify any similar prosecution in Washington (or anywhere else in the United States)."

In May, a judge partially granted Maybrown's motion for a "bill of particulars," in which prosecutors explained exactly which part of the promoting-prostitution statute his client was charged under and on what rationale. Shortly thereafter, Maybrown and lawyers of otherisn't the first time this year that a plea deal brokered by Ernsdorff raised eyebrows. In March, a 9th Circuit Court of Appeals panel reprimanded the state prosecutor (as well as Wagnild, who served as a King County prosecutor himself from 1998 to 2011) for his role in a 2003 case involving a man named Joshua Frost. Frost now "maintains that the prosecution withheld material, exculpatory evidence" that "would have undermined the testimony of Edward Shaw, a key prosecution witness" who testified in exchange for plea deals on the domestic violence, drug, and unlawful firearm charges he was facing, the court explained.

"We are…troubled by the conduct of Gary Ernsdorff, the deputy prosecuting attorney who handled Shaw's domestic-violence case," wrote appellate Judge Alex Kozinski in an opinion cosigned by