Court Opinion

ID: 9392964
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-05-08 18:13:00.84891+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:18:50.113490
License: Public Domain

J-A01026-23

NON-PRECEDENTIAL DECISION - SEE SUPERIOR COURT I.O.P. 65.37

    COMMONWEALTH OF PENNSYLVANIA               :   IN THE SUPERIOR COURT OF
                                               :        PENNSYLVANIA
                                               :
                v.                             :
                                               :
                                               :
    JOSEPH H. CAMBURN III,                     :
                                               :
                       Appellant               :   No. 1967 EDA 2022

                  Appeal from the Order Entered July 19, 2022
       In the Court of Common Pleas of Bucks County Criminal Division at
                        No(s): CP-09-CR-0002912-2021

BEFORE: LAZARUS, J., NICHOLS, J., and McCAFFERY, J.

MEMORANDUM BY NICHOLS, J.:                                FILED MAY 08, 2023

        Appellant Joseph H. Camburn III1 appeals from the judgment of

sentence imposed after he pled guilty to possessing child pornography and

criminal use of a communication facility.2 Appellant argues that the trial court

erred in determining that he was a sexually violent predator (SVP). Following

our review, we affirm on the basis of the trial court opinion.

        The trial court summarized the underlying facts of this matter as follows:

        This case arises out of a report to law enforcement from Twitter
        that a certain user had uploaded numerous images of sexual
____________________________________________

1 We note that although Appellant listed his name as “Joseph Camburn” on
the notice of appeal, the trial court docket includes Appellant’s full name,
“Joseph H. Camburn III.” Therefore, we have amended the caption to reflect
Appellant’s name as it was listed on the trial court’s docket. See Pa.R.A.P.
904(b)(1) (stating that “[t]he parties shall be stated in the caption as they
appeared on the record of the trial court at the time the appeal was taken”).

2   18 Pa.C.S. §§ 6312(d) and 7512(a), respectively.
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        exploitative material of children using the Twitter platform on or
        about January 28, 2021. Through investigation, Detective Dante
        Montella of the Bucks County District Attorney’s Office was able to
        identify Appellant as the account holder and made contact with
        him on March 19, 2021. At this time, Detective Montella took
        possession of Appellant’s cell phone, Appellant confirmed that the
        Twitter account in question, “Countryboy4110,” was his, provided
        the detective with his cell phone number, and admitted to
        possessing child pornography.

Trial Ct. Op., 9/20/22, at 1.

        On December 3, 2021, Appellant entered an open guilty plea to

possessing child pornography and criminal use of a communication facility.

The trial court deferred sentencing for the Sexual Offenders Assessment Board

(SOAB) to determine whether Appellant was an SVP. On July 19, 2022, the

trial court conducted an SVP hearing.            At the hearing, the Commonwealth

presented SOAB expert Stephen Pflugfelder, who concluded that Appellant

met the criteria for an SVP pursuant to the Sexual Offenses Reporting and

Notification Act3 (SORNA II). At the conclusion of the hearing, the trial court

designated Appellant as an SVP. That same day, the trial court sentenced

Appellant to a term of two-to-five-years’ imprisonment for possessing child

pornography and a concurrent term of five years’ probation for criminal use

of a communication facility. Appellant did not file post sentence motions.

____________________________________________

3   42 Pa.C.S. §§ 9799.10-9799.42.

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       Appellant filed a timely notice of appeal.4 Both Appellant and the trial

court complied with the requirements of Pa.R.A.P. 1925.

       On appeal, Appellant raises the following issue for our review:

       Did the lower court err in making a finding that the
       Commonwealth had met its burden of proving that Appellant was
       [an SVP] pursuant to 42 Pa.C.S. § 9799[.24]?

Appellant’s Brief at 4 (formatting altered).

       Initially, Appellant concedes that he has a mental abnormality or

personality disorder. Id. at 11. However, Appellant argues that he does not

meet the statutory criteria for an SVP because the Commonwealth failed to

establish that he engaged in predatory behavior. Id. In support, Appellant

alleges that Mr. Pflugfelder “could not point [to] any conduct by Appellant that

was predatory in a sexual way.” Id. at 17 (citing N.T. SVP Hr’g, 7/19/22, at

40-43, 46-47, 50, 53, 55). Further, Appellant claims that his prior convictions

for terroristic threats and harassment were not relevant to the SVP

determination because the underlying allegations were “never proven to a

‘clear and convincing’ standard.” Id. at 17-18. Appellant also argues that Mr.

Pflugfelder    erroneously     relied   on     other   allegations   that   were   never

adjudicated, including a juvenile offense concerning an obscene phone call

____________________________________________

4 Appellant’s notice of appeal did not indicate the date of the order or
judgment being appealed. See Notice of Appeal, 7/27/22. After this Court
issued a rule to show cause order, Appellant filed a response stating that he
intended to appeal from the judgment of sentence imposed on July 19,
2022. Accordingly, the rule is discharged, and we have amended the
caption accordingly.

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J-A01026-23

and a report from Bucks County Children and Youth Services (CYS) in which

Appellant was alleged to have taken sexually suggestive photographs of

children who were under his care. Id. at 15-17. For these reasons, Appellant

concludes that there was insufficient evidence that he engaged in the

predatory behavior necessary to support an SVP determination. Id. at 18-19.

      We review an SVP designation to determine whether the Commonwealth

presented clear and convincing evidence that the defendant meets the

statutory definition of an SVP. Commonwealth v. Hollingshead, 111 A.3d

186, 189 (Pa. Super. 2015). “As with any sufficiency of the evidence claim,

we view all evidence and reasonable inferences therefrom in the light most

favorable to the Commonwealth [as verdict winner].” Id. (citation omitted).

      To prove a defendant is an SVP, the Commonwealth must first establish

that the defendant was convicted of a sexually violent offense. Then the

Commonwealth must prove that the defendant has “a mental abnormality or

personality disorder that makes [them] likely to engage in predatory sexually

violent offenses.” 42 Pa.C.S. § 9799.12. The statute defines “mental

abnormality” as “[a] congenital or acquired condition of a person that affects

the emotional or volitional capacity of the person in a manner that predisposes

that person to the commission of criminal sexual acts to a degree that makes

the person a menace to the health and safety of other persons.”        Id. The

defendant’s conduct must be “predatory,” which the statute defines as “[a]n

act directed at a stranger or at a person with whom a relationship has been

instituted, established, maintained, or promoted, in whole or in part, in order

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to facilitate or support victimization.” Id.; Commonwealth v. Stephens, 74

A.3d 1034, 1038 (Pa. Super. 2013); see also Commonwealth v. Geiter,

929 A.2d 648, 651 (Pa. Super. 2007).

     In determining whether an individual meets the definition of an SVP, the

SOAB evaluates the following factors:

        (1) Facts of the current offense, including:

           (i) Whether the offense involved multiple victims.

           (ii) Whether the individual exceeded the means necessary
           to achieve the offense.

           (iii) The nature of the sexual contact with the victim.

           (iv) Relationship of the individual to the victim. (v) Age of
           the victim.

           (vi) Whether the offense included a display of unusual
           cruelty by the individual during the commission of the crime.

           (vii) The mental capacity of the victim.

        (2) Prior offense history, including:

           (i) The individual’s prior criminal record.

           (ii) Whether the individual completed any prior sentences.

           (iii) Whether the individual         participated   in    available
           programs for sexual offenders.

        (3) Characteristics of the individual, including:

           (i) Age.

           (ii) Use of illegal drugs.

           (iii) Any mental      illness, mental disability     or    mental
           abnormality.

           (iv) Behavioral characteristics that contribute to             the
           individual’s conduct.

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         (4) Factors that are supported in a sexual offender assessment
         field as criteria reasonably related to the risk of reoffense.

42 Pa.C.S. § 9799.24(b).

      Here, Appellant claims that there was insufficient evidence that his

conduct was “predatory” for purposes of the SVP determination. In its Rule

1925(a) opinion, the trial court addressed Appellant’s claim as follows:

      [A]n act is predatory when the act is “directed at a stranger or at
      a person with whom a relationship has been initiated, established
      maintained or promoted, in whole or in part, in order to facilitate
      or support victimization.” 42 Pa.C.S. § 9799.12. Furthermore,
      the statutory definition of “predatory” contains no requirement
      that Appellant engaged in predatory behavior in the instant
      offense. See Commonwealth v. Fletcher, 947 A.2d 776, 776
      (Pa. Super. 2008). Rather, the requirement is that the offender
      is likely to engage in predatory behavior, regardless of whether
      the offense at issue was predatory itself. See id.; see also
      [Commonwealth v. Feucht, 955 A.2d 377, 381 (Pa. Super.
      2008) ].

      Mr. Pflugfelder opined that Appellant has engaged in predatory
      behavior in the past, although he stated his belief that [] neither
      the possession of child pornography nor masturbation to the same
      is “predatory behavior” for the purposes of [an] SVP designation.
      N.T. SVP Hr’g at 53-55. Mr. Pflugfelder based this opinion on the
      definition provided by the statute and opined that Appellant’s prior
      conviction in 2002 for terroristic threats in which Appellant made
      an obscene phone call to a stranger[/]victim, constituted
      predatory behavior as defined in the statute. Id. at 40, 53-55.
      Appellant was convicted of harassment in 2006, which according
      to the records of Bucks County Adult Probation, was for making a
      “fraudulent and malicious phone call to 911.” Id. at 56.

      Appellant’s three convictions: terroristic threats resulting from an
      obscene phone call, his harassment conviction for the fraudulent
      and malicious phone call to 911, and the instant conviction for
      child pornography and criminal use of a communication facility
      have an important commonality. In each instance Appellant
      targeted a stranger. Be it the obscene phone call, the 911 call, or
      when he uploaded “obvious child sexual exploitative material” to

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     the website Twitter.com, each of these acts were directed to a
     victim that Appellant did not know.            Moreover, during an
     investigation by [CYS] separate from the instant offense,
     Appellant admitted to masturbating to videos of children he
     personally knew. Id. at 35-36. In light of this information, Mr.
     Pflugfelder found that Appellant had initiated a relationship in part
     or in whole to facilitate victimization. As a result, Appellant has
     engaged in predatory behavior that has both been directed to a
     stranger[/] victim and to an individual to whom he had initiated a
     relationship in part or in whole to facilitate victimization.

     Under the statue, the SOAB assessor conducting [an] SVP
     assessment is required to examine certain statutory indicators.
     These indicators signal the likelihood of future offenses, and are
     not factors to be weighed against each other. The presence of
     factors is the relevant analysis, factors that are not present or
     inapplicable to the current facts do not count against a conclusion
     that [Appellant] is [an] SVP. Of the [fourteen] listed statutory
     sub-indicators, six of them were found present, two were not
     found present, and six were found to be unsuited for Appellant’s
     assessment. This court found that (i) the offense involved
     multiple victims, (ii) the children victims depicted in the child
     sexual exploitative material were of very tender age, (iii)
     Appellant’s prior criminal record counseled for a finding of SVP
     status, (iv) Appellant had completed his prior sentences, (v) the
     fact that Appellant had already completed sexual offender
     treatment and subsequently reoffended, and (vi) Appellant’s
     behavioral characteristics made it likely that he would continue to
     offend. This court found that (a) Appellant had no relationship
     with the victims for the instant offense, and (b) that Appellant’s
     commission of the offense did not involve him displaying unusual
     cruelty. Id. at 62-77.

                                 *    *    *

     In sum, Mr. Pflugfelder concluded that “[Appellant] has engaged
     in sexually inappropriate behaviors over the course of his life that
     would suggest a sexual behavior problem” and “based on his
     mental abnormality and engaging in predatory behavior, he’s
     likely to reoffend.” Id. at 36-37 . . . .

     Nor can Appellant’s additional behavior be ignored. He admitted
     to [CYS] that he has been attracted to children since before he
     was [twelve] years old, and had advanced beyond mere fantasy,
     to the consumption of child pornography, to taking photographs

                                     -7-
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      of the clothed buttocks, bare legs, and bare feet of prepubescent
      children for whom he was in a caretaking role. This type of
      escalating behavior is deeply concerning and strongly suggests
      that Appellant is likely to engage in predatory sexually violent
      behavior in the future.

      Based on Appellant’s prior convictions, which involved predatory
      behavior, along with Appellant’s behavior of covertly taking
      photographs of young female children he was babysitting, and the
      violent, cruel nature of the pornographic files found on Appellant’s
      devices, this court was satisfied that the Commonwealth, through
      Mr. Pflugfelder, presented clear and convincing evidence as to not
      only Appellant’s mental abnormality, but also as to the presence
      of predatory behavior. This court is also satisfied that Mr.
      Pflugfelder thoroughly considered the requisite statutory factors
      listed in 42 Pa.C.S. § 9799.24(b) as they relate to the
      circumstances surrounding the instant case. Mr. Pflugfelder
      assessed and pointed to several statutory factors that increased
      Appellant’s likelihood of reoffending, such as the age of the victims
      depicted in the child pornography being prepubescent, the fact
      that Appellant had been investigated in the past [by CYS] for
      allegedly looking at the intimate parts of one of the children
      Appellant was in a caregiving role with, and the fact that Appellant
      previously completed sex offender treatment back in 2004. N.T.
      SVP Hr’g at 36, 48. Mr. Pflugfelder testified that the fact that
      Appellant had previously undergone treatment and then
      reoffended afterward is more concerning than if Appellant had
      never undergone sex offender treatment. Id. at 48.

Trial Ct. Op. at 9-13 (some citations omitted, formatting altered).

      On this record, viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the

Commonwealth, we agree with the trial court that there was sufficient

evidence establishing that Appellant engaged in predatory conduct.            See

Hollingshead, 111 A.3d at 189. We agree with the trial court’s analysis of

the evidence presented at the SVP hearing, including Mr. Pflugfelder’s

testimony that the trial court found credible and supported by the record which

described Appellant’s history of predatory behavior. See N.T. SVP Hr’g at 60-

                                      -8-
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77; see also Trial Ct. Op. at 8. Therefore, Appellant’s challenge to the SVP

determination is meritless, and no relief is due. See Stephens, 74 A.3d at

1038. For these reasons, we affirm on the basis of the trial court’s opinion.

      Judgment of sentence affirmed.

Judgment Entered.

Joseph D. Seletyn, Esq.
Prothonotary

Date: 5/8/2023

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