State Of Louisiana v. Leonardo Mastascuso

• Court: Louisiana Court of Appeal
• Decided: May 28, 2020
• Docket: 2019KA0825
• Status: Unknown

Opinion

NOT DESIGNATED FOR PUBLICATION

STATE OF LOUISIANA

COURT OF APPEAL

FIRST CIRCUIT

2019 KA 0825

VERSUS

LEONARD MASTASCUSO

JUDGMENT RENDERED: MAY 2 8 2020

Appealed from the

Twenty -First Judicial District Court In and for the Parish of Tangipahoa • State of Louisiana Docket Number 14- 01218 • Division " F"

The Honorable Elizabeth P. Wolfe, Judge Presiding

Bruce G. Whittaker ATTORNEY FOR APPELLANT, Louisiana Appellate Project DEFENDANT— Leonard New Orleans, Louisiana Mastascuso

Scott M. Perilloux ATTORNEYS FOR APPELLEE,

District Attorney State of Louisiana Hammond, Louisiana

Patricia Dale Parker Amos Assistant District Attorney Amite, Louisiana

BEFORE: MCCLENDON, WELCH, AND HOLDRIDGE, JJ.

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Y. WELCH, J.

The State of Louisiana charged the defendant, Leonardo Mastascuso, by bill

of information with six counts of possession of pornography involving juveniles

when the victim is under the age of thirteen years, violations of La. R.S.

14: 81. 1( A)( 1). The defendant pled not guilty and, following a jury trial, was found

guilty as charged on all counts. The defendant filed a motion for new trial, which

the trial court denied. On each count, the trial court sentenced the defendant to ten

years imprisonment at hard labor without benefit of parole, probation, or

suspension of sentence and ordered the sentences to run concurrently. The

defendant now appeals, designating two assignments of error. We affirm the

convictions and sentences.

FACTS

In 2013, the Cyber Crime Unit ( CCU) of the Louisiana Attorney General' s

Office, supervised by Agent Brian Brown, was monitoring the internet activity of

the defendant, who lived alone in an apartment in Tickfaw. Equipped with a

database of all the child pornography throughout the state, the CCU ran a computer

program on an automated system that connected with peer to peer ( P2P) programs,

or file -sharing networks, to detect if people on the internet were exchanging

images of child pornography. Agent Brown received information from the system

that a particular IP address with a Hammond, Louisiana address had downloaded

forty images of child pornography. In addition to the IP address, the information

captured revealed the date and time the images were on the person' s computer, the

names of the image and video files exchanged, and the program used to access the

various P2P programs. In particular, the program identified five GUIDs, or global

unique identifiers. Agent Brown explained at trial that every time the P2P program

LimeWire was installed on the defendant' s computer, a new GUID was generated.

Based on the IP address, Agent Brown contacted Charter Communications,

2 who provided the defendant' s name as the person paying for the internet service.

Agent Brown obtained a search warrant, and on the morning of December 18,

2013, law enforcement officers searched the defendant' s apartment. During the

search, Agent Brown interviewed the defendant, who denied that he downloaded

any child pornography. The officers took various photographs and seized ten

devices belonging to the defendant, namely, four internal hard drives, a thumb

drive, a cell phone, an Apple iPad, an external hard drive, a Seagate hard drive, and

an Apple MacBook Pro.

Thomas Ferguson, a computer forensic examiner with the Louisiana

Attorney General' s CCU, examined all of the devices. Ferguson found pictures

and videos of pornography involving juveniles on four of the defendant' s hard

drives. The hard drive at issue in this case was the defendant' s Maxtor hard drive,

which contained eleven video files of child pornography that were in the operating

system' s recycle bin, but had not yet been deleted.' Clips of these eleven videos

were played for the jury to establish the six counts against the defendant.

Derek Hinch testified for the defense as an expert in computer forensics,

general computer security, function and storage of digital devices, and operation of

P2P networks. Hinch did not look at or examine any devices. He only looked at

the Attorney General' s Office reports. Hinch was shown the law enforcement

photographs taken at the defendant' s apartment. According to Hinch, there was

nothing in those photographs capable of connecting or powering up any of the

devices, particularly the hard drives, to make them viewable. The defendant did

not testify.

ASSIGNMENT OF ERROR I

In his first assignment of error, the defendant argues the trial court erred in

1 Two images of pornography were found in an unallocated space on this hard drive, which meant they had been deleted but forensically recovered.

3 denying his motion for new trial. Specifically, the defendant contends the trial

court allowed the State to present unduly prejudicial evidence, despite the

defendant' s offer to stipulate.

At trial, defense counsel offered to stipulate that the videos found on the

defendant' s computer hard drive contained child pornography. That is, to prevent

the jury from viewing such objectionable material, defense counsel offered to

relieve the State of having to prove several elements of possession of pornography

involving juveniles by stipulating that at least six of the pornographic videos

involved children under thirteen years of age and that a reasonable person knew or

should have known that the children were under the age of thirteen. The State

declined the stipulation, preferring that the jury, as factfinder, determine the age of

the children in the videos. Further, the State indicated it had the right to present its

case, which included showing the jury what the defendant possessed. The trial

court ruled that the videos had probative value and that the State could show the

videos to the jury. Fifty-seven pictures and twenty videos on the defendant' s hard

drives were flagged as containing child pornography and submitted to the National

Center for Missing and Exploited Children. The State offered to show, and in fact

did show, only minimal amounts of eleven videos.

The defendant argues in brief that because the State did not accept the

stipulation, the jury was " required to view the most heinous material" it might have

to review. According to the defendant, " the entirely avoidable and undue prejudice

caused by requiring the jury to consume the offensive pornographic material was

an error which deprived" him of his right to due process and a fair trial.

We find no error in the admission of the evidence relating to what the

defendant had in his possession on and prior to December 18, 2013. The videos of

child pornography were clearly relevant in that they established the defendant

possessed these video files and that they contained children under the age of

0 thirteen years. See La. C. E. art. 401. The State was not required to accept the

defendant' s stipulation in lieu of presenting evidence. The State cannot be robbed

of the moral force of its case merely because a stipulation is offered. State v.

Watson, 449 So. 2d 1321, 1326 ( La. 1984), cert. denied, 469 U.S. 1181, 105 S. Ct.

939, 83 L. Ed. 2d 952 ( 1985). See State v. Davis, 2013- 237 ( La. App. 5" Cir.

10/ 30/ 13), 128 So. 3d 1162, 1171, writ denied, 2013- 2751 ( La. 5/ 23/ 14), 140 So.

3d 723; State v. Chiasson, 2010- 0205 ( La. App. 1St Cir. 6/ 11/ 10), 2010 WL

2342765, at * 3 ( unpublished), writ denied, 2010- 1637 ( La. 1/ 28/ 11), 56 So. 3d

967.

The videos shown to the jury, which contained child pornography, were

necessarily prejudicial to the defendant. However, the trial court was correct in

allowing the videos to be played to the jury since this evidence proved some of the

essential elements of the State' s case, so that its probative value exceeds any

prejudicial effect to the defendant. See State v. Watson, 484 So. 2d 870, 874- 75

La. App. 1St Cir.), writ denied, 488 So. 2d 1018 ( La. 1986) ( finding that the

exclusion of the recording on the basis of defense counsel' s proposed stipulation

would have unjustifiably deprived the State of the moral force of its evidence since

the recording was highly relevant to several of the central issues of the case; the

probative force of the recording exceeded that of other evidence tending to

establish the same fact; and a mere verbal stipulation would not have captured the

forcefulness of the recording itself).

Despite defense counsel' s multiple attempts at a stipulation to the contents of

the video files in the defendant' s possession, the prosecution was entitled to prove

its case by evidence of its own choice, and the defendant was not entitled to

stipulate or admit his way out of the full evidentiary force of the case as the

government chose to present it. State v. Ball, 99- 0428 ( La. 11/ 30/ 99), 756 So. 2d

275, 280.

9 Based on the foregoing, we find the trial court did not err in denying the

defendant' s motion for new trial. Accordingly, this assignment of error is without

merit.

ASSIGNMENT OF ERROR 2

In his second assignment of error, the defendant argues the evidence was

insufficient to support the six convictions. Specifically, the defendant contends

that he did not knowingly possess the child pornography found in his home.

A conviction based on insufficient evidence cannot stand as it violates Due

Process. See U.S. Const. amend. XIV; La. Const. art. I, § 2. The standard of

review for the sufficiency of the evidence to uphold a conviction is whether

viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the prosecution, any rational

trier of fact could have found the essential elements of the crime beyond a

reasonable doubt. Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307, 319, 99 S. Ct. 2781, 2789,

61 L. Ed. 2d 560 ( 1979). See La. C. Cr.P. art. 821( B); State v. Ordodi, 2006- 0207

La. 11/ 29/ 06), 946 So. 2d 654, 660. The Jackson standard of review,

incorporated in Article 821, is an objective standard for testing the overall

evidence, both direct and circumstantial, for reasonable doubt. When analyzing

circumstantial evidence, La. R.S. 15: 438 provides that the factfinder must be

satisfied that the overall evidence excludes every reasonable hypothesis of

innocence. State v. Patorno, 2001- 2585 ( La. App. 1St Cir. 6/ 21/ 02), 822 So. 2d

141, 144.

It shall be unlawful for a person to produce, promote, advertise, distribute,

possess, or possess with the intent to distribute pornography involving juveniles.

La. R.S. 14: 81. 1( A)( 1). Pornography involving juveniles is a general intent crime.

See State v. Cinel, 94- 0942 ( La. 11/ 30/ 94), 646 So. 2d 309, 316, cert. denied, 516

U.S. 8811 116 S. Ct. 2151 133 L. Ed. 2d 146 ( 1995). General criminal intent is

present when the circumstances indicate that the offender, in the ordinary course of human experience, must have adverted to the prescribed criminal consequences as

reasonably certain to result from his act or failure to act. La. R.S. 14: 10( 2). Id. at

314.

The element of possession includes both " actual" and " constructive"

possession. State v. Sandifer, 95- 2226 ( La. 9/ 5/ 96), 679 So. 2d 1324, 1331. A

person who is not in physical possession may have constructive possession when

the contraband is under that person' s dominion and control. In determining

whether a defendant exercised dominion and control sufficient to constitute

constructive possession, the fact finder may consider, among other factors, the

defendant' s knowledge of the contraband and his access to the area where the

contraband is found. State v. Becnel, 2016- 1297 ( La. App. 1St Cir. 4/ 20/ 17), 220

So. 3d 27, 30, writ denied, 2017- 1023 ( La. 3/ 9/ 18), 238 So. 3d 451. Guilty

knowledge may be inferred from the circumstances of the case. State v. Pigford,

2005- 0477 ( La. 2/ 22/ 06), 922 So. 2d 517, 521 ( per curiam). A person may be in

joint possession of contraband if he willfully and knowingly shares with another

the right to control the contraband. Becnel, 220 So. 3d at 30- 31.

The defendant herein does not deny that the video files on the computer hard

drives in his home contained child pornography. He contends, rather, that the State

failed to prove that he knowingly possessed child pornography. The defendant

suggests there was no direct evidence that he was aware of the presence of

contraband on his devices, namely the hard drives. According to the defendant, the

lack of ability to view the contents of the hard drives was indicative of no intent to

possess the child pornography. That is, the " presence of the inert pile of electronic

devices" in his apartment did not equate to his knowing possession of the

contraband images " found hidden therein."

Upon review of all the evidence presented in this case, we find the State

proved the defendant was in knowing possession of child pornography. The

7 evidence established that the defendant, through a P2P network, downloaded video

files of child pornography on whatever computer he was using, likely in 2012. The

Attorney General' s Office tracked the transmission of these video files during this

time and learned that the IP address being used to obtain these files belonged to the

defendant. The IP address was tied to the physical location of the defendant' s

apartment in Tickfaw, which he had been living in for six years.

Ferguson also testified about internet history from 2005 found on the

defendant' s Maxtor hard drive. These were not the same videos found in the

recycle bin of the Maxtor hard drive and played for the jury. One of the file names

in the 2005 internet history was: " unwrapping a prize, dash man undresses and

feels up 12yoniceassbigpussyredgaping . . . PTHCPedo.MPG" Ferguson

explained that PTHC stood for preteen hardcore, and " Pedo" was short for

pedophile. Another file name in the defendant' s internet history was:

elevenyodutchpreteenp. ingfillednudesaunarapeanallolitaPTCHpedochildporninces

t( 155. MPG)."

It is true, as the defendant noted, that the hard drives containing child

pornography that were found in his apartment by law enforcement officers were

not connected to anything. That is, they were not inside of a computer tower,

connected to any power source or video monitor. As such, the hard drives, as

found and seized, could not be viewed by the defendant. Several photographs were

also taken of various items in the defendant' s apartment. Ferguson conceded in his

testimony that none of the various devices or objects in these photos could power

up a hard drive or be used to connect any of the hard drives to each other, or to any

other device seized, including the defendant' s Apple MacBook, the laptop

computer the defendant had been using at the time the hard drives were seized

from his apartment.

The jury rationally concluded that, despite the defense theory to the contrary,

8 the defendant had intentionally downloaded child pornography, viewed those

videos on his computer, and kept on various hard drives pictures and videos of his

choosing. The child pornography computer video files that were shown to the jury

were found on the defendant' s Maxtor hard drive, which was in the defendant' s

possession.

Based on the testimonial and physical evidence, the jury found the defendant

guilty, which was a direct refutation of the defendant' s account of ignorance or lack

of knowledge. The trier of fact is free to accept or reject, in whole or in part, the

testimony of any witness. The trier of fact' s determination of the weight to be

given evidence is not subject to appellate review. An appellate court will not

reweigh the evidence to overturn a factfinder' s determination of guilt. State v.

Talley, 2018- 1300 ( La. App. 1St Cir. 5/ 9/ 19), 277 So. 3d 397, 403. We are

constitutionally precluded from acting as a " thirteenth juror" in assessing what

weight to give evidence in criminal cases. State v. Mitchell, 99- 3342 ( La.

10/ 17/ 00), 772 So. 2d 78, 83. The fact that the record contains evidence which

conflicts with the testimony accepted by a trier of fact does not render the evidence 1St accepted by the trier of fact insufficient. State v. Nixon, 2017- 1582 ( La. App.

Cir. 4/ 13/ 18), 250 So. 3d 273, 291, writ denied, 2018- 0770 ( La. 11/ 14/ 18), 256 So.

3d 290. In the absence of internal contradiction or irreconcilable conflict with the

physical evidence, one witness' s testimony, if believed by the trier of fact, is

sufficient to support a factual conclusion. State v. Higgins, 2003- 1980 ( La.

4/ 1/ 05), 898 So. 2d 1219, 1226, cert. denied, 546 U.S. 883, 126 S. Ct. 182, 163 L.

Ed. 2d 187 ( 2005).

Particularly, faced with conflicting expert opinions, the jury was entitled to

accept whichever one, in their opinion, better explained the facts of the case. See

La. C. E. art. 702. An appellate court should not disturb the jury' s choice to accept

one expert' s opinion unless that opinion is patently unsound. State v. Becnel,

9 2017- 591 ( La. App. Stn Cir. 6/ 27/ 18), 250 So. 3d 1207, 1229.

When a case involves circumstantial evidence and the jury reasonably

rejects the hypothesis of innocence presented by the defense, that hypothesis falls,

and the defendant is guilty unless there is another hypothesis which raises a

reasonable doubt. State v. Moten, 510 So. 2d 55, 61 ( La. App. 1St Cir.), writ

denied, 514 So. 2d 126 ( La. 1987). The jury heard all of the testimony and viewed

the evidence presented to it at trial and found the defendant guilty. In finding the

defendant guilty, the jury clearly rejected the defense' s theory of innocence. See

Moten, 510 So. 2d at 61. See State v. Weary, 2003- 3067 ( La. 4/ 24/ 06), 931 So.

2d 297, 311- 12, cert. denied, 549 U. S. 1062, 127 S. Ct. 682, 166 L. Ed. 2d 531

2006).

After a thorough review of the record, we find the evidence supports the

jury' s unanimous guilty verdicts. We are convinced that viewing the evidence in

the light most favorable to the State, any rational trier of fact could have found

beyond a reasonable doubt, and to the exclusion of every reasonable hypothesis of

innocence, that the defendant was guilty of six counts of possession of

pornography involving juveniles. See State v. Calloway, 2007- 2306 ( La. 1/ 21/ 09),

1 So. 3d 417, 418 (per curiam). This assignment of error is without merit.

Accordingly, we affirm the defendant' s convictions and sentences.

CONVICTIONS AND SENTENCES AFFIRMED.