Commonwealth v. Lynch

72 A.3d 706, 2013 Pa. Super. 218, 2013 WL 3874981, 2013 Pa. Super. LEXIS 1696
CourtSuperior Court of Pennsylvania
DecidedJuly 29, 2013
StatusPublished
Cited by52 cases

This text of 72 A.3d 706 (Commonwealth v. Lynch) 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
Commonwealth v. Lynch, 72 A.3d 706, 2013 Pa. Super. 218, 2013 WL 3874981, 2013 Pa. Super. LEXIS 1696 (Pa. Ct. App. 2013).

Opinions

OPINION BY

STEVENS, P.J.

Calvin Lynch, Appellant, files this appeal from the judgment of sentence of six to twelve years’ incarceration for intimidation of a witness or victim, 18 Pa.C.S. § 4952. Appellant contends that the evidence was either insufficient to prove intimidation as contemplated by the statute or, if deemed so sufficient, unsupportive of a felony grading of the offense. On a record showing Appellant offered to his assault victim benefits designed to compel her absence from his criminal trial, we hold that Appellant committed an act the legislature explicitly sought to proscribe through its enactment of Section 4952. We affirm.

The trial court provides an apt recitation of relevant and undisputed facts, as follows:

On October 10, 2009, the victim in this case was brutally beaten with a baseball bat by [Appellant] who was her boyfriend and the father of her children After hitting his victim with the bat, [Appellant] choked her until she lost consciousness. As a result of this assault the victim sustained a large gash to her head requiring six or seven stitches, a fractured elbow requiring surgery, bruises to her neck and arm and cuts on her legs and one of her knees. Just days later, [Appellant] made two collect calls to the victim from prison asking her to drop the charges and not to show up in court to testify On October 17, 2009, the victim received the handwritten letter from [Appellant] asking her to drop the charges or not show up to testify.

Trial Court Opinion (“TCO”), 6/8/11, at 1-2.

The crux of Appellant’s sufficiency challenge states that:

[t]he evidence was insufficient to prove the offense of intimidation of witnesses at 18 Pa.C.S. § 4952 — or at least a felony version of that offense — where the content of the communications was not intimidating and where [Appellant] did not offer the complainant a pecuniary or other benefit.

Brief for Appellant at 13.

As a general matter, our standard of review of sufficiency claims requires [708]*708that we evaluate the record “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. Widmer, 560 Pa. 308, 744 A.2d 745, 751 (Pa.2000). “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.” Commonwealth v. Brewer, 876 A.2d 1029, 1082 (Pa.Super.2005). Nevertheless, “the Commonwealth need not establish guilt to a mathematical certainty.” Id.; see also Commonwealth v. Aguado, 760 A.2d 1181, 1185 (Pa.Super.2000) (“[T]he facts and circumstances established by the Commonwealth need not be absolutely incompatible with the defendant’s innocence”). Any doubt about the defendant’s guilt is to be resolved by the fact finder unless the evidence is so weak and inconclusive that, as a matter of law, no probability of fact can be drawn from the combined circumstances. See Commonwealth v. DiStefano, 782 A.2d 574, 582 (Pa.Super.2001).
The Commonwealth may sustain its burden by means of wholly circumstantial evidence. See Brewer, 876 A.2d at 1032. Accordingly, “[t]he fact that the evidence establishing a defendant’s participation in a crime is circumstantial does not preclude a conviction where the evidence coupled with the reasonable inferences drawn therefrom overcomes the presumption of innocence.” Id. (quoting Commonwealth v. Murphy, 795 A.2d 1025, 1038-39 (Pa.Super.2002)). Significantly, we may not substitute our judgment for that of the fact finder; thus, so long as the evidence adduced, accepted in the light most favorable to the Commonwealth, demonstrates the respective elements of a defendant’s crimes beyond a reasonable doubt, the appellant’s convictions will be upheld.
See Brewer, 876 A.2d at 1032.

Commonwealth v. Stays, 70 A.3d 1256, 1266, 2013 WL 3378980, at *7-8 (Pa.Super.2013).

The witness intimidation statute reads, in its entirety, as follows:

(a) Offense defined. — A person commits an offense if, with the intent to or with the knowledge that his conduct will obstruct, impede, impair, prevent or interfere with the administration of criminal justice, he intimidates or attempts to intimidate any witness or victim to:
(1) Refrain from informing or reporting to any law enforcement officer, prosecuting official or judge concerning any information, document or thing relating to the commission of a crime.
(2) Give any false or misleading information or testimony relating to the commission of any crime to any law enforcement officer, prosecuting official or judge.
(3) Withhold any testimony, information, document or thing relating to the commission of a crime from any law enforcement officer, prosecuting official or judge.
(4) Give any false or misleading information or testimony or refrain from giving any testimony, information, document or thing, relating to the commission of a crime, to an attorney representing a criminal defendant.
(5) Elude, evade or ignore any request to appear or legal process summoning him to appear to testify or supply evidence.
(6) Absent himself from any proceeding or investigation to which he has been legally summoned.
(b) Grading.—
[709]*709(1) The offense is a felony of the degree indicated in paragraphs (2) through (4) if:
(i) The actor employs force, violence or deception, or threatens to employ force or violence, upon the witness or victim or, with the requisite intent or knowledge upon any other person.
(ii) The actor offers any pecuniary or other benefit to the witness or victim or, with the requisite intent or knowledge, to any other person.
(iii) The actor’s conduct is in furtherance of a conspiracy to intimidate a witness or victim.
(iv) The actor accepts, agrees or solicits another to accept any pecuniary or other benefit to intimidate a witness or victim.
(v) The actor has suffered any prior conviction for any violation of this section or any predecessor law hereto, or has been convicted, under any Federal statute or statute of any other state, of an act which would be a violation of this section if committed in this State.
(2) The offense is a felony of the first degree if a felony of the first degree or murder in the first or second degree was charged in the case in which the actor sought to influence or intimidate a witness or victim as specified in this subsection.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
72 A.3d 706, 2013 Pa. Super. 218, 2013 WL 3874981, 2013 Pa. Super. LEXIS 1696, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/commonwealth-v-lynch-pasuperct-2013.