SANDPOINT - Counsel for a Priest Lake man accused of soliciting sex trafficking in North Dakota is moving for the indictment to be dismissed.

Michael Thomas Sackett is awaiting trial in U.S. District Court on a charge of attempted sex trafficking of 12-year-old child in 2013. He is accused of attempting to recruit the child for a commercial sex act.

Sackett, 47, was indicted by a federal grand jury in Bismarck after being arrested amid a campaign to curb crime in North Dakota's oil patch country.

James Siebe, Sackett's counsel, moved to dismiss the case last month on grounds the child in the case is not an actual person and the federal code he was indicted under applies to those who engage in commercial sex trafficking, not would-be consumers of the illicit trade.

Siebe bolsters his argument with a report by the Congressional Research Service which holds that the code Sackett is being prosecuted under is meant to target those who organize and profit from sex trafficking.

"In conclusion, not only does the language of the statute itself clearly allude to those on the provision and profiting side of sex trafficking, but the report from the Congressional Research Service makes no reference to applicability to individuals such as Mr. Sackett," Siebe said in a memorandum of support of the motion to dismiss that was filed on April 1.

Federal prosecutors dispute Siebe's argument and maintain that federal code does not require there to be an actual victim in cases of attempted sex trafficking. They further contend that the code applies to both suppliers and consumers of commercial sex acts.

Acting U.S. Attorney Christopher Myers and Assistant U.S. Attorney Gary Delorme point to a federal case from South Dakota in which Daron Lee Jungers was convicted of attempted sex trafficking of children for agreeing to pay money for sex with a fictitious underage girl.

The 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the conviction.

Myers and Delorme wrote that "the Eighth Circuit has already, on point, decided the issue in Jungers by a determination that this particular section of law applies equally to consumers as it does for traffickers."