Com. v. Reyes-Acosta, J.

CourtSuperior Court of Pennsylvania
DecidedJuly 26, 2023
Docket469 MDA 2022
StatusUnpublished

This text of Com. v. Reyes-Acosta, J. (Com. v. Reyes-Acosta, J.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Superior Court of Pennsylvania primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Com. v. Reyes-Acosta, J., (Pa. Ct. App. 2023).

Opinion

J-A09040-23

NON-PRECEDENTIAL DECISION - SEE SUPERIOR COURT O.P. 65.37

COMMONWEALTH OF PENNSYLVANIA : IN THE SUPERIOR COURT OF : PENNSYLVANIA : v. : : : JOEL S. REYES-ACOSTA : : Appellant : No. 469 MDA 2022

Appeal from the Judgment of Sentence Entered October 26, 2021, in the Court of Common Pleas of York County, Criminal Division at No(s): CP-67-CR-0007777-2019.

BEFORE: PANELLA, P.J., OLSON, J., and KUNSELMAN, J.

MEMORANDUM BY KUNSELMAN, J.: FILED: JULY 26, 2023

Joel Reyes-Acosta appeals from the judgment of sentence entered after

a jury found him guilty of indecent assault and harassment.1 We reverse and

remand for a new trial based on the Commonwealth’s violation of Brady v.

Maryland, 373 U.S. 83 (1963).

On October 2, 2019, Officer Thomas Wales of the Springettsbury

Township Police Department filed a criminal complaint charging Reyes-Acosta

based on an incident on September 13, 2019. The case proceeded to a jury

trial on July 20 and 21, 2021. The trial court recounted the evidence:

The victim, [M.G.], worked as an assistant manager at Suburban Park Apartments where [Reyes-Acosta] lived. [M.G.] had to interact with [Reyes-Acosta] when he would bring in his rent checks. [Any time he saw her, Reyes-Acosta] would tell [M.G.] she was beautiful or comment about her height or outfit. ____________________________________________

1 18 Pa.C.S.A. §§ 3126(a)(1) and 2709(a)(4). J-A09040-23

One time [Reyes-Acosta] stated she “looked tired and that he wanted to give [her] a massage and lick the oil off [her] body.”

[M.G.] stated [Reyes-Acosta] made her uncomfortable for months prior to the incident at hand. Approximately a week before the incident in question, at a community event at the apartment complex, [Reyes-Acosta] pinned [M.G.] between a bush and her car stating, “he wanted to eat [her] pussy and eat [her] ass.” [M.G.] informed her manager, Stephanie Hartranft …, who was not there but was able to send her daughter in to ensure [M.G.] was not alone. None of the incidents prior to September 13, 2019, were reported to the police.

On September 13, 2019, the date of the incident leading to the charges in the instant case, [M.G.] … was smoking outside her office when [Reyes-Acosta] sat down next to her, inquiring about how to remove himself from his lease. When the conversation was finished, [M.G.] went inside to the bathroom to throw her cigarette out like she normally would, and when she turned around, [Reyes-Acosta] “was standing there with his arms up on the door blocking [her] from coming back.” She hurriedly walked out but, in the hallway, [Reyes-Acosta] put his arms around her “waist and his hand on [her] butt and told [her] he wanted to eat [her] pussy and ass and tried to kiss [her].” To avoid [Reyes- Acosta’s] open-mouth kiss, [M.G.] turned her head, so [Reyes- Acosta] got saliva on her face instead of her lips.

[M.G.] “pushed [past] him” and got back to work while [Reyes-Acosta] made himself some coffee. [Reyes-Acosta] saw a check had fallen on the floor next to [M.G.], so [Reyes-Acosta] approached her and took his hand and rubbed it down [M.G.’s] back and down into her pants. [H]e started in between her shoulder blades and as he rubbed downward, she pushed herself back into her chair to stop his hand from going any further.

Once [Reyes-Acosta] left, [M.G.] notified Stephanie, a maintenance staff member, and the police about the incident. Approximately fifteen minutes after the incident, a tenant named Christine [Heinrich] had come to the office to hand out fliers, but stayed and comforted [M.G.] until police came. Although the police were called, Stephanie confirmed that [M.G.] did not give [Reyes-Acosta] a no trespass order for the leasing office.

On September 18, 2019, Officer Thomas Wales received an apology letter from Stephanie that was written by [Reyes-Acosta]. In the letter, [Reyes-Acosta] apologized for the

-2- J-A09040-23

“misunderstanding” and thanked [M.G.] for “always telling me to take care of my family.”

Trial Court Opinion, 6/6/22, at 2–4.

The jury found Reyes-Acosta guilty of indecent assault and harassment.

On October 26, 2021, the trial court sentenced Reyes-Acosta to serve 2 weeks

to 23 months of incarceration concurrent with 12 months of probation and to

pay $28,556.82 in restitution. Reyes-Acosta filed a post-sentence motion

claiming, inter alia, that the Commonwealth violated Brady by failing to

provide until after sentencing a letter from the workers’ compensation insurer

that paid benefits to M.G. related to this incident. The trial court heard and

denied Reyes-Acosta’s post-sentence motion after a hearing on February 16,

2022. Reyes-Acosta timely appealed. Reyes-Acosta and the trial court

complied with Pennsylvania Rule of Appellate Procedure 1925.

Reyes-Acosta presents five issues for review:

A. Was the evidence insufficient to support the charges, where the Commonwealth did not establish that Mr. Reyes-Acosta had contact with the complainant’s intimate parts, and the Commonwealth’s evidence was wholly unreliable?

B. Did the lower court err and abuse its discretion in granting the Commonwealth’s motion in limine and admitting other acts evidence, where the court failed to conduct the balancing test that [Pa.R.E. 404(b)] requires, and the Commonwealth did not meet an exception to the rule against the admission of this type of evidence?

C. Did the trial court err and abuse its discretion in denying Mr. Reyes-Acosta’s post-sentence motion seeking a new trial based on a Brady violation, where the Commonwealth withheld the complainant’s worker’s compensation letter containing favorable and material information until Mr. Reyes-Acosta’s sentencing?

-3- J-A09040-23

D. Was the verdict against the weight of the evidence, where the complainant embellished her testimony and the only other witness admitted to “being forgetful?”

E. Did the trial court abuse its discretion at sentencing by failing to state on the record its reason for imposing a term of incarceration when the Sentencing Guidelines recommended a sentence as low as probation?

Reyes-Acosta’s Brief at 7–8.

A. Sufficiency of the Evidence

Reyes-Acosta’s first issue is a challenge to the sufficiency of the

evidence. His argument is twofold. First, he argues that M.G.’s cheek and

pants-covered buttocks are not “sexual or intimate parts” of her body, which

the Commonwealth had to prove that Reyes-Acosta touched for the offense of

indecent assault. Second, he contends that the testimony of Heinrich and

M.G. was so inherently unreliable that it was insufficient to prove either crime.

We employ a well-settled scope and standard of review:

A claim challenging the sufficiency of the evidence is a question of law. Evidence will be deemed sufficient to support the verdict when it establishes each material element of the crime charged and the commission thereof by the accused, beyond a reasonable doubt. Where the evidence offered to support the verdict is in contradiction to the physical facts, in contravention to human experience and the laws of nature, then the evidence is insufficient as a matter of law. When reviewing a sufficiency claim[,] the court is required to view the evidence in the light most favorable to the verdict winner giving the prosecution the benefit of all reasonable inferences to be drawn from the evidence.

Commonwealth v. Johnson, 180 A.3d 474, 478 (Pa. Super. 2018) (quoting

Commonwealth v. Widmer, 744 A.2d 745, 751 (Pa. 2000)).

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Bluebook (online)
Com. v. Reyes-Acosta, J., Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/com-v-reyes-acosta-j-pasuperct-2023.