United States v. Caesar

582 F.Supp.3d 216

UNITED STATES of America

v.Robert Dean CAESAR

CRIMINAL ACTION NO. 18-525

United States District Court, E.D. Pennsylvania.

Filed January 27, 2022

Erica Danielle Kivitz, Seth M. Schlessinger, Assistant US Attorneys, Robert A. Zauzmer, United States Attorney's Office, Philadelphia, PA, for United States of America.

Mythri A. Jayaraman, Public Defender, Federal Community Defender, Stephen P. Patrizio, Dranoff & Patrizio, P.C., Philadelphia, PA, for Robert Dean Caesar.

MEMORANDUM

PAPPERT, District Judge

A grand jury indicted Robert Caesar for producing, receiving, and possessing child pornography in violation of 18 U.S.C. §§ 2251(a), 2252(a)(2), and 2252(a)(4)(B). His trial is scheduled to begin February 23, 2022. The Government moves to introduce "prior acts" evidence against Caesar under Federal Rules of Evidence 404 and 414. After considering the parties' briefing and holding oral argument on the Motion, the Court grants it in part and denies it in part.

I

Chester County law enforcement began investigating Caesar in July 2017 after learning he had purchased large quantities of boys' underwear and bathing suits on eBay. (Gov't Am. Mot. in Limine at 1, ECF 28.) He often asked for pictures of the sellers' children wearing the underwear and bathing suits, purportedly to see whether they would fit his own, fictitious children. (Id. at 1–2.)

Six months later, two teenage brothers came forward to say Caesar had sexually abused them. (Id. ) Minors One and Two, who were fourteen and sixteen at the time, explained that after they performed yard work at his home, Caesar would invite them inside to watch movies. (Id. ) During these encounters, he would give them alcohol and encourage them to take off their clothes. (Id. ) He touched both children's genitals and instructed them to touch his. (Id. )

A search of Caesar's home produced several devices containing more than seventy thousand images and videos of child pornography. (Id. ) Among them were several sexually explicit images of Minor One, which he said Caesar had taken. (Id. ) Officials also discovered a sexually explicit image of Minor One on Caesar's cellphone. (Id. ) Minor One explained he had taken the photo and sent it to Caesar at Caesar's request. (Id. )

The images of Minor One form the basis for Counts One and Two, which charge Caesar with production of child pornography. The other images and videos found at Caesar's home underlie Counts Three and Four, which charge him with receipt and possession of child pornography.

II

A

The Government seeks to introduce evidence that in addition to abusing Minor One, Caesar abused or attempted to abuse seven other children, including Minor Two.

According to the Government, Caesar began abusing Minor Two when he was fourteen years old. He provided Minor Two with alcohol while he was at his house performing yard work, then invited him to his bedroom to watch movies or TV. (Id. at 5.) There, he would masturbate and perform oral sex on Minor Two and instruct Minor Two to masturbate him. (Id. at 6.) He also pressured Minor Two to perform oral sex on him and to engage in intercourse. (Id. ) Finally, he showed Minor Two videos of "men and women, boy and boys, and girls and girls" having sex. (Id. )

Minor Three worked for Caesar for one day in 2017. (Id. ) He was fifteen at the time. (Id. ) Caesar told the boy he could walk around his house naked and watch pornography in Caesar's bedroom. (Id. ) He also told Minor Three he had "two Amish boys" who worked for him and with whom he would lie on his bed and watch movies. (Id. ) Minor Three relayed these remarks to his parents and never returned. (Id. )

Minor Four is Caesar's nephew, now more than thirty. (Id. at 7.) When Minor Four visited Caesar's residence as a child, Caesar tried to get him to swim or sleep naked. (Id. ) He has no memory of Caesar touching him, though he could not be sure Caesar had not done so while he slept. (Id. )

Minors Five and Six were nine and fourteen in 2005. At the time, Caesar lived with his sister and Minors Five and Six lived nearby. (Id. ) During a sleepover at Caesar's sister's house, Caesar fondled Minor Five's genitals and buttocks. (Id. ) He also took photographs of Minor Six in his underwear, touched his genitals, and performed oral sex on him. (Id. ) He paid Minor Six one dollar for each photograph. (Id. ) On November 11, 2021, Caesar pleaded guilty to incident assault of minors Five and Six.

Caesar molested Minor Seven in the early 1980s, when the boy was twelve years old. (Id. ) Caesar took Minor Seven to his bedroom, pulled down his pants and began masturbating him. (Id. )

In 2016, Caesar went fishing with Minor Eight, a twelve-year-old boy. (Id. at 8.) During this trip, he took Minor Eight to his house and demanded Minor Eight take off his clothes, which had gotten wet, so Caesar could dry them. (Id. ) He then asked Minor Eight if he wanted to shower with him and when the child said no, Caesar took a shower while Minor Eight sat on his bed. (Id. ) He then laid down next to Minor Eight, put his arm around him and rubbed Minor Eight's leg with his own. (Id. ) Caesar only allowed Minor Eight to leave after he began to cry. (Id. )

B

In addition to the evidence Caesar abused or attempted to abuse other minors, the Government seeks to admit evidence he had been investigated for possession of child pornography on two prior occasions.

In 2012, Chester County police searched Caesar's home after the FBI linked his IP address to a Yahoo email account that had received at least four emails containing sexually explicit images of male children the year before. (Id. at 8–9.) The search did not reveal any child pornography. (Id. at 9.)

About a year later, investigators learned a different Yahoo email account transmitting child pornography was regularly accessed from the defendant's home, his workplace and the home of one of his coworkers. (Id. ) Police searched Caesar's laptop and discovered around 150 images of child pornography. (Id. at 10.)

III

The Government contends this evidence is admissible pursuant to Federal Rules of Evidence 414 and 404(b). It asserts that in addition to revealing his propensity to commit crimes involving child sexual abuse—a proper purpose for evidence admitted under Rule 414—Caesar's prior child molestation and possession of child pornography demonstrate his motive, intent and plan to produce child pornography and his knowledge that the devices recovered from his home contained child pornography. (Id. at 13.) The Government anticipates Caesar will argue the devices belonged to a houseguest who died in 2011, and it believes evidence Caesar transmitted and possessed child pornography after his houseguest's death is important to rebutting that defense. (Id. ; Hr'g Tr. at 109:4–22, ECF 60.)

Caesar maintains there is no proper non-propensity purpose for any of this evidence, and even if some of it is admissible under Rules 414 or 404(b), its probative value is substantially outweighed by the risk of unfair prejudice, confusing the issues, and presenting needlessly cumulative evidence. The charged offenses—production, receipt, and possession of child pornography—are distinct from the sexual abuse allegations that form the bulk of the Government's prior act evidence. (Def.'s Resp. at 2.) Moreover, much of the evidence is remote in time, concerns inchoate acts of abuse, or traffics in uncorroborated suspicions. (Id. at 2–3.) As a consequence, Caesar argues, admitting this evidence would taint the jury's perception and force him to litigate the significance of decades-old encounters that have little or no connection to the case at hand. (Id. at 8; Hr'g Tr. at 17–20.)

IV

A

Prior bad acts may be admitted as intrinsic or extrinsic evidence. See United States v. Green , 617 F.3d 233, 245 (3d Cir. 2010). Evidence is intrinsic, and not subject to Federal Rule of Evidence 404(b), only if it directly proves the charged offense or if the "uncharged acts [are] performed contemporaneously with the charged crime [and] they facilitate that commission of the charged crime." Id. at 248–49.

Courts analyze extrinsic prior act evidence under Rule 404(b), which prohibits evidence of "a crime, wrong, or other act" used "to prove a person's character in order to show that on a particular occasion the person acted in accordance with the character." Fed. R. Evid. 404(b)(1). This evidence "may be admissible for another purpose, such as proving motive, opportunity, intent, preparation, plan, knowledge, identity, absence of mistake, or lack of accident." Fed. R. Evid. 404(b)(2). The "permitted uses" of prior act evidence set forth in Rule 404(b)(2) are treated like exceptions to 404(b)(1)'s "prohibited uses," and "the party seeking to admit evidence under 404(b)(2) bears the burden of demonstrating its applicability." United States v. Caldwell , 760 F.3d 267, 276 (3d Cir. 2014) ; see also id. (" Rule 404(b) is a rule of general exclusion, and carries with it no presumption of admissibility.") (internal quotations and citation omitted). " Rule 404(b) must be applied with careful precision, and ... evidence of a defendant's prior bad acts is not to be admitted unless both the proponent and the District Court plainly identify a proper, non-propensity purpose for its admission." Id. at 274 (citing United States v. Davis , 726 F.3d 434, 442 (3d Cir. 2013) ).

Prior bad act evidence must satisfy a four-part test to be admissible under Rule 404(b). Specifically, the evidence must be:

(1) offered for a proper non-propensity purpose that is at issue in the case; (2) relevant to that identified purpose; (3) sufficiently probative under Rule 403 such that its probative value is not outweighed by any inherent danger of unfair prejudice; and (4) accompanied by a limiting instruction, if requested.

Id. at 277–78 (citing Davis , 726 F.3d at 441 ).

Evidence is relevant if "it has any tendency to make a fact more or less probable than it would be without the evidence" and "the fact is...