People v. Parlier

2023 IL App (4th) 220091

217 N.E.3d 1100

466 Ill.Dec. 824

The PEOPLE of the State of Illinois, Plaintiff-Appellee,

v.Aaron PARLIER, Defendant-Appellant.

NO. 4-22-0091

Appellate Court of Illinois, Fourth District.

Filed February 6, 2023

Gal Pissetzky, of Pissetzky Law, LLC, and Adam Bolotin, of Law Offices of Adam Bolotin, LLC, both of Chicago, for appellant.

Don Knapp, State's Attorney, of Bloomington (Patrick Delfino, David J. Robinson, and Allison Paige Brooks, of State's Attorneys Appellate Prosecutor's Office, of counsel), for the People.

JUSTICE CAVANAGH delivered the judgment of the court, with opinion.

¶ 1 In a bench trial, the circuit court of McLean County found defendant, Aaron Parlier, guilty of 10 counts of child pornography and 10 counts of predatory criminal sexual assault of a child. The court sentenced him to imprisonment for 450 years. He appeals on three grounds.

¶ 2 First, defendant argues that the circuit court erred by denying his motion to quash the search warrants and to suppress evidence. We uphold this ruling because we find the police officers’ reliance upon the search warrant to have been in good faith.

¶ 3 Second, defendant claims that the indictment failed to set forth the nature of the child pornography offenses. We disagree. The language of the child pornography counts closely followed the language of the statute. By tracking the statutory language, the indictment caused defendant no prejudice.

¶ 4 Third, defendant contends that the State failed to prove him guilty of all 10 counts of child pornography and of any of the counts of predatory criminal sexual assault of a child. When we view all the evidence in a light most favorable to the prosecution, we conclude that a rational trier of fact could find, beyond a reasonable doubt, the disputed elements of all 20 charged offenses.

¶ 5 Therefore, we affirm the judgment.

¶ 6 I. BACKGROUND

¶ 7 On January 30, 2018, Detective John Heinlen of the police department of Bloomington, Illinois, submitted to the circuit court a sworn "Complaint for Search Warrant." In his complaint, he recounted his recent interviews of Jane Doe, defendant, and A.G.

¶ 8 On September 21, 2017, when Heinlen interviewed Jane Doe, she was 17 years old. She told him that, from the time she was five or six until she was a freshman in high school, she took piano lessons from defendant. (Defendant's date of birth, Heinlen noted, was March 30, 1981.) The piano lessons took place in Bloomington. On several occasions, as Jane Doe grew older, defendant instructed her to take off her clothes after he had left the room and to play the piano while naked. His stated aim was to help her overcome stage fright before recitals. She became suspicious, however, that he was watching her, because one time, after she had put her clothes back on and he had reentered the room, he asked her why she had not fully undressed. She further told Heinlen that on two occasions, when she was in seventh or eighth grade, defendant touched her breasts with his hand. Also, she said that defendant had her try on a chain-mail bikini he had made. Finally, she recounted that when she was in her early teens, defendant e-mailed her three photographs of his erect penis, and he showed her a photograph of a woman's breasts on his telephone, telling her they were the breasts of his ex-girlfriend.

¶ 9 On December 5, 2017, Heinlen interviewed defendant. In this interview, which was audio-recorded, defendant admitted having Jane Doe play naked to help her overcome stage fright. He admitted sending her a photograph of his erect penis. He admitted having an ongoing sexual relationship with a former piano student of his, A.G. (who, Heinlen noted, was born on July 18, 1997). He admitted that, when A.G. was between 14 and 16 years old, he engaged in penetration with her on four or five occasions and oral sex on four or five occasions. Defendant said that, usually, these sexual encounters occurred in his vehicle or in his Bloomington apartment.

¶ 10 On January 25, 2018, Heinlen interviewed A.G. She told Heinlen that, from the ages of 6 to 11, she took piano lessons from defendant. She divulged that, from the time she was 12 years old and in seventh grade until her freshman year of high school, she and defendant had a sexual relationship, which included vaginal and oral penetration. A.G. provided the following additional details. Defendant engaged in penetration on 20 occasions or more, usually in his Bloomington apartment. Often, defendant video-recorded their sexual encounters, using a camcorder. He enjoyed tearing her clothing and underwear off her. Because of her experiences with defendant, A.G. believed he would have kept her torn clothing and the recordings of the sexual encounters.

¶ 11 On January 26, 2018 (Heinlen continued in his complaint), the police obtained a warrant to search defendant's residence at 1806 Pier Way, apartment 212, in Bloomington. When they executed the search warrant, the apartment appeared to have been vacated. The keys had been left on the kitchen counter. Management for the apartment complex told Heinlen that defendant had not been seen for a month and that he had not notified management he was moving out.

¶ 12 On January 30, 2018, the Bloomington police received an anonymous telephone call that defendant was driving a black Dodge Journey SUV. When defendant surrendered on an arrest warrant in the 1300 block of Warner Street in Normal, Illinois, he told Detective Thomas Rena he had left his cellular telephone in his vehicle. A black Dodge Journey SUV was located nearby. It was parked in a business parking lot and was registered to defendant's brother, Shawn Parlier.

¶ 13 Later that same day, defendant's mother-in-law, Diane Martin, told Rena that defendant was living on Deer Lane in Mackinaw, Illinois. Rena saw a vehicle parked at 15930 Deer Lane that was registered to defendant's wife, Amanda Martin.

¶ 14 Those were the facts that Heinlen laid out in his complaint, under the heading of "Investigation." Under the heading of "Probable Cause," he explained why he had probable cause to believe that evidence relating to child pornography, predatory criminal sexual assault of a child, and criminal sexual assault would be found in computers, cellular telephones, cameras, or digital media in the house at 15930 Deer Lane and in the black Dodge Journey SUV. He relied on his training and experience as a police officer:

"D.5. Based on my training, experience, and conversations with other detectives experienced in child pornography investigations, I know that it is common for people that possess images of child pornography to save those images to items of removable media such as [compact discs (CDs), digital video discs (DVDs), secured data (SD) cards], and other types of digital media.

***

D.7. Based on my training, experience[,] and conversations with other detectives experienced in computer forensic investigations, I know that it is common for people who[ ] possess images of child pornography to also take pictures or videos of children in an attempt to either produce child pornography for their own use or to trade to others in an attempt to increase their collection of child pornography. *** I know that these pictures and videos may be recovered from the computer hard drives, cellular phone, digital camera, digital video recorder[,] or other items of digital media even if deleted by the user. Furthermore, it is common for individuals who produce, view[,] and/or collect child pornography to retain possession of the child pornography and transfer it from an older digital storage device to a newer device over time."

¶ 15 On January 30, 2018, on the basis of Heinlen's complaint, a judge issued a warrant to search 15930 Deer Lane and the black Dodge Journey SUV for computers, cellular telephones, cameras, digital media, and other specified items. The police executed the search warrant that same day.

¶ 16 On March 28, 2018, a grand jury returned a bill of indictment, charging defendant with a total of 38 counts, which pertained to multiple different victims. The circuit court granted a motion by the defense to sever counts. The State chose to proceed on counts XIX through XXXVIII, the counts pertaining to a girl whose initials were E.W.

¶ 17 Counts XIX through XXVIII alleged that from April 15, 2012, through April 15, 2016, defendant committed offenses of child pornography. Originally, these counts alleged a violation of section 11-20.1(a)(1)(vii) of the Criminal Code of 2012 ( 720 ILCS 5/11-20.1(a)(1)(vii) (West 2012); 720 ILCS 5/11-20.1(a)(1)(vii) (West 2014); 720 ILCS 5/11-20.1(a)(1)(vii) (West 2016)). Before the bench trial, however, without objection by the defense, the circuit court allowed the State to replace the citations to section 11-20.1(a)(1)(vii) with citations to section 11-20.1(a)(1)(ii) ( 720 ILCS 5/11-20.1(a)(1)(ii) (West 2012); 720 ILCS 5/11-20.1(a)(1)(ii) (West 2014); 720 ILCS 5/11-20.1(a)(1)(ii) (West 2016)). The remaining 10 counts, counts XXIX through XXXVIII, alleged that from April 15, 2012, through April 15, 2016, defendant committed offenses of predatory criminal sexual assault of a child ( 720 ILCS 5/11-1.40(a)(1) (West 2012); 720 ILCS 5/11-1.40(a)(1) (West 2014); 720 ILCS 5/11-1.40(a)(1) (West 2016)).

¶ 18 On December 18, 2018, defendant filed a motion to quash the search warrants and to suppress all evidence the police had seized pursuant to the warrants. The grounds for the motion were essentially threefold. First, defendant claimed that the events that supposedly created probable cause happened too long ago, or were "stale." Second, he asserted an absence of facts justifying a reasonable belief that he (1) lived in either the Pier Way apartment or the Deer Lane house, (2) kept his personal belongings at either address, or (3) possessed any of the items to be seized. Third, defendant claimed there was no nexus between the alleged offenses and the black Dodge Journey SUV. The circuit court...