People v. Brown

313 P.3d 608, 2011 WL 3332314, 2011 Colo. App. LEXIS 1298
Colorado Court of Appeals·Decided August 4, 2011·No. No. 08CA1275·Published·Cited by 17 cases

Opinion

Opinion by

Judge DAILEY.

Defendant, Douglas L. Brown, appeals his judgments of conviction entered on jury verdicts finding him guilty of three counts of sexual exploitation of a child. We affirm.

After executing a search warrant for defendant's home, the police seized numerous items including, as pertinent here, a laptop and an external hard drive for a computer. [612] On the laptop and hard drive, the police found a photograph and two videos depicting child pornography.

At trial, the People presented the testimony of

® a computer forensics expert who stated that the laptop was registered to defendant and that he found the three images in the active, not deleted, files;
e a detective, qualified as an expert in the detection of child pornography, who stated that the images did not appear to be faked and that the individuals depicted therein were "clearly under the age of eighteen"; and
e a doctor, qualified as an expert in the field of pediatrics and child development, who testified that the individuals in the photo and in one of the videos were about ten to thirteen years old and that the persons in the other video were, at most, sixteen years old.

Defendant denied knowing that the image and videos were on his computer or knowing ly downloading child pornography. He testified that over thirty people had access to his computer and could have used his computer for whatever purpose they wanted. He also related that he was aware, beforehand, that the police were coming to his house to execute a search warrant.

Defendant argued that because he knew the police were coming and willingly left his home without attempting to delete the files, the jury should infer that he did not know about, much less was responsible for, the pornographic materials. In addition, defendant argued that the police did not know if the images were tampered with or manipulated, who took them, when they were taken, or the age of the people in them, and thus, they only assumed that the photo and videos depicted real children. In this respect, he asserted that software is available to make "any photograph of anything you want."

The jury found defendant guilty as charged.

I. Admission of Photograph and Videos

Defendant contends that the trial court erroneously admitted the photo and videos that depicted child pornography over his foundation, authentication, and CRE 408 objections. We are not persuaded.

In the trial court, defendant argued that (1) the prosecutor had the burden to prove that the photo and videos depicted real children; (2) because the prosecutor could not establish that the images accurately represented what was depicted, the images could not be properly authenticated; and (8) displaying the images to the jury would be prejudicial to him because it would "think the worst of him."

The trial court held that the prosecution was not required to prove that the materials depicted real children and that, because "this type of material is the crux of the three counts(,] ... there's really no way around" the prejudice to defendant. Accordingly, it overruled defendant's objections and admitted the evidence.

On appeal, defendant argues that

® the court erroneously concluded that the prosecution did not have to prove that the images depicted real (as opposed to virtual) children;
© the photo and videos were not, in any event, properly authenticated because no witness could say when, where, how, or under what conditions, they were created; and
® he suffered extreme prejudice from the jury's viewing of the images.

We address-and reject-each assertion in turn.

A. Foundation

A person commits the crime of sexual exploitation of a child if, for any purpose, he or she knowingly possesses or controls any sexually exploitative material. § 18-6-403(8)(b.5),1 Under the applicable version of the statute, "sexually exploitative material" is a depiction of "a child en[613] gaged in, participating in, observing, or being used for explicit sexual conduct." See Ch. 139, see. 8, § 18-6-403(2)(), 1998 Colo. Sess. Laws 398.2

Section 18-68-4083 prohibits only the use of real children in sexually exploitative material. People v. Campbell, 94 P.3d 1186, 1190 (Colo.App.2004). Accordingly, to con-viet a defendant of sexual exploitation of a child under section 18-6-403, the prosecution must prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the image(s) depict real children, Campbell, 94 P.3d at 1190, and the trial court erred in concluding otherwise. Nonetheless, we can affirm the introduction of the evidence if, despite this error, it was properly admitted. See People v. Quintana, 882 P.2d 1366, 1375 (Colo.1994) (a defendant's conviction will not be reversed if a trial court reaches the correct result although by an incorrect analysis).

Here, the evidence was admissible despite the trial court's misconception of the law. This follows because even where, as in Colorado, the government must prove that the images are of actual children, it is not required to present evidence of a child's identification or expert testimony establishing that the image depicts a real child. See United States v. Sims, 428 F.3d 945, 957 (10th Cir.2005); see also Umited States v. McNealy, 625 F.3d 858, 865 (5th Cir.2010) (no requirement that the government present expert testimony or additional evidence to establish that the image depicts a real child); United States v. Wilder, 526 F.3d 1, 11 (1st Cir.2008) (the government is not required to produce a technology expert to prove that an image contains real children); United States v. Hoey, 508 F.3d 687, 691 (1st Cir.2007) (the prosecution is not required to produce expert testimony to establish that the depicted child is real); United States v. Salcido, 506 F.3d 729, 733-34 (9th Cir.2007) (same).

Where, as here,

the relevance of evidence depends upon the fulfillment of a condition of fact, neither the trial court nor a reviewing court serves as the trier of fact. Rather, the rules of evidence require the trial court to admit the evidence upon or subject to the introduction of evidence sufficient to support a finding by the jury of that condition of fact, CRE 104(b) (Relevancy conditioned on fact). Only if there is no evidence from which reasonable jurors could find the condition of fact should the challenged evidence be rejected as irrelevant.

Free access — add to your briefcase to read the full text and ask questions with AI

People v. Brown, 313 P.3d 608, 2011 WL 3332314, 2011 Colo. App. LEXIS 1298 (Colo. Ct. App. 2011).

313 P.3d 608 (People v. Brown) — published by Counsel Stack Legal Research, free access to 12M+ legal documents.

Related

Peo v. Medrano
Colorado Court of Appeals, 2026
Peo v. French
Colorado Court of Appeals, 2026
Peo in Interest of BM
Colorado Court of Appeals, 2026
Peo v. Vreeland
Colorado Court of Appeals, 2025
Peo v. Edwards
Colorado Court of Appeals, 2025
Peo v. Mondy
Colorado Court of Appeals, 2025
Peo v. Germanson
Colorado Court of Appeals, 2025
Peo v. Plascencia
Colorado Court of Appeals, 2025
State of Arizona v. Brian Matthew MacHardy
521 P.3d 613 (Court of Appeals of Arizona, 2022)
Peo v. Rhoades
Colorado Court of Appeals, 2021
Peo v. Martinez
2020 COA 141 (Colorado Court of Appeals, 2020)
v. Vidauri
2019 COA 140 (Colorado Court of Appeals, 2019)
v. Dominguez
2019 COA 78 (Colorado Court of Appeals, 2019)
v. Richardson
2018 COA 120 (Colorado Court of Appeals, 2018)
People v. Ortega
2015 COA 38 (Colorado Court of Appeals, 2015)
People v. Brown
2014 COA 130 (Colorado Court of Appeals, 2014)
People v. Samson
2012 COA 167 (Colorado Court of Appeals, 2012)
People v. Doubleday
2012 COA 141 (Colorado Court of Appeals, 2012)
People v. Munoz-Casteneda
2012 COA 109 (Colorado Court of Appeals, 2012)
People v. Douglas
2012 COA 57 (Colorado Court of Appeals, 2012)