Its not bullshit guys
Nice find.
Its not bullshit guys, 5 minutes of searching confirms.
I must confess that the department of corrections inmate roster is not something I have on speed-dial
I don't doubt there is a law (probably several) against this on the books. Along with stuff like
serving pretzels at bars and playing bingo for more than five hours.
Also,
Another intermediate possibility is that some mid-level law enforcement officer jumped the gun on this, running a sting and grabbing these guys without discussing it thoroughly with senior enough prosecutors. End result these guys get set loose with no charges in a few days and we never know the difference. Since this was a sting there were clearly "operations" people involved; maybe it was all operations people and no lawyers, and right now those operations people are sitting down with a bunch of state attorneys who are explaining to them that "yes, that law is on the books" but their time is not well spent (nor their careers advanced) by chasing kids for trading baseball cards. Even if baseball cards are "trendy" right now and all over the news.
^^ stuff like that is why most news organizations wait for the charging documents or press release before they run a story. Happens more often than you'd think.