Commonwealth v. Dietrich

258 A.3d 534 (Table)

COMMONWEALTH of Pennsylvania

v.Carlos DIETRICH, Appellant

No. 1797 EDA 2019

Superior Court of Pennsylvania.

Filed June 17, 2021

MEMORANDUM BY NICHOLS, J.:

Appellant Carlos Dietrich appeals from the judgment of sentence imposed following his convictions for promoting prostitution, corruption of a minor, involuntary servitude, trafficking in minors, kidnapping, and three counts of conspiracy.¹ Appellant challenges the exclusion of evidence relating to prior allegations of sexual conduct by the victim, the sufficiency and weight of the evidence, the trial court's jury instructions, and his sentence. We affirm.

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

At trial, in her very thorough and highly credible and compelling testimony, the [victim], U.P.T., vividly described all of the relevant events. She testified that she had first met [Appellant], who until the time of his arrest, she knew only as Ten-Ten or Tim-Tim, while she was a 16-year-old tenth grade student at a store near the high school she had been attending. At first, they were merely casual acquaintances. This relationship gradually evolved into a closer more personal one after he had wooed her romantically.

She related that on one Friday night, while she was spending the night at the home of her best friend, [D.R.], she texted [Appellant] and asked him to get her some liquor for [D.R.'s] birthday party the next evening; he said he would do so but it had to be later. When he picked her up at [D.R.'s] home the next day, he had a man with him called "Money" and, instead of taking her to the store to get some liquor as she expected, they transported her in a vehicle to the Roosevelt Inn.

Along the way, [Appellant] repeatedly told her that she should have sex with other people to "Make money for us." She had initially responded that she "didn't feel comfortable with it because of past situations" she had been in; at first he asked her mildly but over time he became more forceful. They slept together for a while when they arrived at the Inn after which he took her to a store and bought her something to eat; after that he picked up a woman named "Bacardi." They took her to a store and had her nails done and bought her bras and panties and went back to the Roosevelt Inn.

Once back at the Roosevelt Inn, [the victim] was kept isolated in a [rented] room ... where [Appellant and his cohorts] repeatedly cajoled [the victim] into agreeing to working as a prostitute for them. Bacardi took pictures of her wearing the underwear they bought for her and posted them on Back Page, a website for soliciting escorts and prostitutes, giving her the trade name Diamond; though neither of them actually threatened to physically harm her, she cooperated with the venture for fear that if she refused or sought any assistance from anyone it might result in physical injury to herself and anyone who tried to render her assistance. This fear was aroused by the angry demeanor they had displayed whenever she tried to express her disapproval or reluctance of the situation.

Appellant and his cohorts gave this sixteen-year-old liquor and marijuana, purportedly to calm her down. After she became high, she began prostituting herself for them. While she could not recall all details because she had been high and drunk all the time; she concretely related the process of how either Ten-Ten, Bacardi or Money arranged "dates" for her. She stated that Bacardi had remained close by all of them "for her protection." She remembered quite clearly the sexual acts that she had performed and the fact that she had been required to hand over all the proceeds for those sexual acts performed to them.

At one point, she described receiving a text from her friend [D.R.] asking where she was because she had not appeared at school or responded to her inquiry of her whereabouts. She did not reply at first, but later texted her back and told her she was fine and expected to be back when school resumed on Tuesday. On Tuesday when she was briefly left alone at one point, she successfully texted [D.R.] and told her what was going on; [D.R.] promised to get her cousin to come rescue her but she told her not to do so because they were still at the Inn and she was afraid they might injure her and the cousin.

On Wednesday, [Appellant] and his conspirators left the Roosevelt Inn without her, having given her directives and the impression that they were arranging to transfer her to a different motel to resume their prostitution operation. When she was alone in their room, the Inn employees told her she couldn't stay there because no one had paid for the room. She walked to the lobby and sat on the couch to await [Appellant] as instructed.

Thankfully, in the interim, [D.R.] had reported the incident to their school that morning and the school officials immediately contacted the Philadelphia Police Department. As a result, police officers arrived at the Roosevelt Inn while she was still seated in the lobby. As she was getting into the police car, she panicked when she saw Money and another man approaching, and assumed he was coming to get her from the Inn. She pointed him out to the police and they arrested him. At trial upon presentation by the Commonwealth, she identified a corroborating still from the Inn's surveillance camera that displayed her, Ten-Ten, and Bacardi together at the Inn.

* * *

[At trial, t]he Commonwealth called [D.R.,] who credibly confirmed all of the events of which she was personally aware as described by the [victim]. She added the clarification that on the Wednesday morning after she had been told by the victim what was going on, with whom she knew as Tim-Tim or Ten-Ten. She verified her report to the school counselor who had then relayed this same information to the dean who then communicated it to the school police who reported it to the Special Victims Unit (SVU), who came and rescued the victim and, after they interviewed them both at the station, advised them that they should transfer out of their present school since they might not be safe in that area. [D.R.] corroborated the victim's testimony in every significant aspect.

During the course of her convincing testimony, [D.R.] identified the statement she had given to the police which, as defense counsel noted during cross examination, did contain copies of the text messages between her and the victim. Defense counsel himself read aloud those text messages to the jury and enlisted her confirmation of their content in an apparent attempt to bolster his already discredited victim's ability but failure to seek assistance theory. Again this attempt to dissuade the jury belief of the victim failed because it completely ignored her repeatedly expressed fears of what harm might have ensued to her and others if she tried to obtain help.

Police Officer Sharee Day described responding to the emergency call for help from the high school police, briefly questioning [D.R.], and reporting it to the Sexual Violence Unit of the Philadelphia Police Department (SVU). SVU Detective Joseph Jenkins testified that he had shown the victim a photographic array, to which she had unequivocally identified [Appellant's] photograph. The Commonwealth then called Craig Judd, a Forensic Scientist II DNA Analyst with the Office of Forensic Science, which was an accredited forensic laboratory of the Philadelphia Police Department. He testified as to analyzing DNA samples obtained from the victim's body in the hospital and the samples obtained from [Appellant] and finding that [Appellant's] sperm, along with that of another unidentified male, had been present in the [victim's] vagina.

SVU Detective Kevin Gage described receiving the report of the incident from the police officers who responded with others to the call from the high school police and finding the victim at the Roosevelt Inn, speaking to her briefly in their patrol car and reporting her identification of Money, who they arrested. Detective Gage testified that the victim had also described the [Appellant's] vehicle to him and they drove around the area and found it and directed that it be secured by other officers and confiscated for further inspection. He reported that he had transported the victim to the SVU, obtained a summarized statement from her and then transported her to the hospital for examination and DNA sample extraction.

Based upon the information he had gleaned and having been provided a description of [Appellant] by the victim, Detective Gage related that he had been able to find records and photographs of [Appellant], the latter of which he turned over to Officer Jenkins to perform the photo array identification. He then described searching [Appellant's] vehicle and finding [Appellant's] ID and a key card, for a room at the Roosevelt Inn which the [victim] had told him was the room she and the others were using; Detective Gage had the owner of the Roosevelt Inn identify the key card and obtained surveillance recordings from him.

At trial, the prosecutor showed the recordings to Detective Gage that had been recovered which he had identified, but did not comment on their content. He also identified his report and the warrant that he had obtained for the [Appellant's] arrest. On cross examination, counsel only established that the Detective had subsequently searched the voluminous Back Page website and, though he found "hundreds" of Diamonds listed, none of them appeared to be the victim. After the Commonwealth and defense counsel moved their exhibits into evidence and the court conducted a colloquy of [Appellant] concerning his decision not to testify, the parties rested.

Trial Ct. Op., 1/29/20, at 5-8.

On October 12, 2018, following a three-day jury trial, Appellant was convicted of all charges. On January 3, 2019, the trial court sentenced Appellant to an aggregate term of twenty-seven to fifty-four years' incarceration followed by twenty-six years' probation. On ...