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The lawyer for a Berkeley landlord facing nine federal charges, including conspiracy to bring aliens to the U.S. illegally and bringing foreigners to the U.S. for “immoral purposes,” has asked Federal District Court Judge Sandra Brown Armstrong to dismiss two of the charges on constitutional grounds.  

In papers filed with the court Friday, Ted Cassman, the lawyer representing Lakireddy Bali Reddy, argues that the 1907 law against importing aliens for “immoral purposes,” is vague and archaic. 

“That phrase is an anachronism dating from a by-gone era,” Cassman wrote in court papers. “But if that era ever existed it has long since passed.”  

In a wide-ranging legal brief touching on other laws relating to the history of prostitution codes, the meaning of the word “debauchery,” and Mormon polygamy, he argues that the century-old law is so unclear and outdated that it violates Reddy’s constitutional right to “due process of law.”  

The legal move is aimed at eliminating charges that Reddy, a wealthy Berkeley landlord, brought teenagers into the United States from a village in Southern India so he could have sex with them. 

Under settled legal principles, a court may find a law invalid if a person of ordinary intelligence would have to guess at its meaning. 

Cassman says the alien importation law’s reference to “immoral purposes” meets this test.  

“The term “immoral purposes” is a boundless and essentially meaningless concept,” Cassman wrote, because it is not clear what conduct it forbids. Many references in the criminal code to “immoral purposes” were long ago replaced with more explicit language forbidding prostitution or sex with minors, Cassman argued.  

He called “inexplicable” Congress’ failure to eliminate that phrase from the alien importation section of the code.  

Reddy and his adult son, Vijay Kumar Lakireddy, were arrested in January as a result of an investigation following the November death of the Indian teen, Chanti Jyotsna Devi Prattipati, who died from carbon monoxide poisoning in one of Reddy’s Berkeley apartments.  

Her sister, whom prosecutors say was 15 years old at the time of Reddy’s arrest, and another young Indian woman, also lived in the apartment. Prattipati’s death was ruled an accident, but an investigation of the teens’ living situation led to charges that Reddy brought the girls into the country for “immoral purposes,” and imported others under false pretenses, to work in various other businesses he owns.  

Reddy is Berkeley’s largest residential landlord and has real estate holdings estimated at $70 million. He is currently free on $10 million bail. 

An autopsy of the deceased teenager revealed that she was two-weeks pregnant. Earlier this year, Judge Armstrong ruled that fetal tissue recovered during the autopsy was to be preserved as evidence.  

Reddy’s son is charged with three counts, including conspiracy to bring illegal aliens to the U.S. A third defendant, accused of posing as the girls’ father, also faces federal charges. 

Cassman says his is the first-ever challenge on vagueness grounds to the 1907 law forbidding importation of aliens for immoral purposes. Quoting from a U.S. Supreme Court opinion, he wrote in his brief that “vague laws may trap the innocent by not providing fair warning.” Besides arguing that the law is void for vagueness, Cassman says he plans to show that the girls were not minors at the time of the incident. Regarding the sex charges, he told the court that “there is no suggestion that any alleged sexual contact was forced or non-consensual.” 

Cassman’s motion to dismiss the sex charges was supposed to be filed Aug. 8, but he and Assistant United States Attorney John W. Kennedy agreed to extend the deadline. The federal government’s reply brief is due on August 25.  

Cassman’s office did not return numerous phone calls from the Daily Planet seeking comment. A spokesperson for the U.S. Attorney’s office said she would have no comment while the case was pending.