Com. v. Wainman Jr., T. ( 2023 )

J-S24043-23
NON-PRECEDENTIAL DECISION - SEE SUPERIOR COURT O.P. 65.37
COMMONWEALTH OF PENNSYLVANIA : IN THE SUPERIOR COURT OF
: PENNSYLVANIA
:
v. :
:
:
THOMAS FRANCIS WAINMAN, JR. :
:
Appellant : No. 1418 MDA 2022
Appeal from the Judgment of Sentence Entered May 2, 2022
In the Court of Common Pleas of Lancaster County Criminal Division at
No(s): CP-36-CR-0000640-2021
COMMONWEALTH OF PENNSYLVANIA : IN THE SUPERIOR COURT OF
: PENNSYLVANIA
:
v. :
:
:
THOMAS FRANCIS WAINMAN, JR. :
:
Appellant : No. 1428 MDA 2022
Appeal from the Judgment of Sentence Entered May 2, 2022
In the Court of Common Pleas of Lancaster County Criminal Division at
No(s): CP-36-CR-0004839-2020
BEFORE: BENDER, P.J.E., LAZARUS, J., and STEVENS, P.J.E.*
MEMORANDUM BY STEVENS, P.J.E.: FILED: SEPTEMBER 26, 2023
Appellant, Thomas Francis Wainman, Jr., appeals from the judgment of
sentence entered in the Court of Common Pleas of Lancaster County after a
jury convicted him on one count of stalking1 at docket number CP-36-4839-
____________________________________________
* Former Justice specially assigned to the Superior Court.
1 18 Pa.C.S.A. § 2709.1(a)(1).
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2020 and one count each of stalking2 and defiant trespass3 at docket number
CP-36-640-2021 for a course of conduct directed at his next-door neighbors.
Sentenced to consecutively-run, aggravate range sentences, Appellant
challenges the sufficiency of the evidence and the discretionary aspects of his
sentence. After careful review, we affirm based on the trial court’s
comprehensive opinion denying Appellant’s post-sentence motions.
The underlying facts of the present case begin with Appellant’s actions
occurring from the months of May through September of 2020, when he
persisted in behavior against his next-door neighbors that led to a series of
charges filed against him. Specifically, a May 14, 2020, incident led police to
charge him with summary harassment on May 19, 2020, a charge on which
he was found guilty on July 31, 2020. Trial Court Opinion, 9/6/2022, at 1.
The September 21, 2020, charge of stalking under docket 4839-2020
was based on an escalation in Appellant’s fixation with the neighbors
manifesting with his “walking the property line between the two homes at
night with a flash light; removing a wooden [survey] stake from the [family’s]
property without consent; throwing a brown substance over the back corner
of the [family’s] yard without consent, killing the grass; placing chairs on the
property line and staring directly into the windows and backyard of the
[family’s] home; and shining bright lights and pointing security cameras into
the [family’s] home.” TCO at 2. Particularly disturbing was an eyewitness
____________________________________________
2 18 Pa.C.S.A. § 2709.1(a)(1).
3 18 Pa.C.S.A. § 3503(b)(1).
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account of Appellant repeatedly swinging a sledgehammer into the ground
while yelling that he hated one of the family members and, on another
occasion, testimony that he followed the family’s daughters in his car while
flashing his high beams at them. N.T. (trial), Vol III, 2/11/22, at 535-550.
Such accounts generated police and court orders directing Appellant to avoid
any contact with the neighboring family or their property.
Appellant ignored these orders and admonitions on December 12, 2021,
when he entered the neighboring family’s property and made multiple trips
onto the front porch, ostensibly to deliver packages in the scope of his
employment with UPS. N.T. (trial), Vol II, at 263. The family watched from
their security cameras as Appellant drove off before circling back, parking the
vehicle near the family’s driveway, staring at the family’s front door with his
window down. The daughter who opened the door to retrieve the packages
testified that Appellant and she made eye contact multiple times before she
finished the task. Only then, she testified, did Appellant “speed away.” N.T.
at 268, 552. For this conduct, Appellant was charged with stalking and defiant
trespass at docket 640-2021.
On February 14, 2022, following a four-day consolidated trial, a jury
found Appellant guilty on two counts of stalking and one count of defiant
trespass. On May 2, 2022, the trial court, proceeding with the benefit of a
pre-sentence investigation report, imposed two aggravated range guideline
sentences of five and on-half to 11 months’ incarceration, and ordered that
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they run consecutively, for an aggregate sentence of 11 to 22 months’
incarceration.
On May 12, 2022, Appellant filed a timely post-sentence motion positing
that the verdict was against the weight or, in the alternative, the sufficiency
of the evidence, and that the court abused its sentencing discretion in
imposing manifestly excessive, aggravated range sentences. By order of
September 6, 2022, the trial court denied Appellant’s post-sentence motion.
This timely appeal follows.
Appellant raises the following two issues for this Court’s consideration:
I. Was the evidence presented by the Commonwealth
insufficient to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that
[Appellant] was guilty of Count 1, Stalking, pursuant to 18
Pa.C.S.A. § 2709.1 on docket 640-2021 where there was
insufficient evidence that [Appellant] acted with the intent
to place the victims in reasonable fear of bodily injury or
cause substantial emotional distress?
II. Did the trial court abuse its discretion by imposing
sentences on both dockets at the top of the aggravated
ranges of the sentencing guidelines without acknowledging
it was doing so or providing sufficient justification for doing
so and further abused its discretion by imposing said
sentences consecutively resulting in a sentence that was so
manifestly excessive to constitute too severe a punishment
and was not consistent with the protection of the public, the
gravity of the offenses and the rehabilitative needs of Mr.
Wainman?
Brief for Appellant, at 6-7.
After reviewing the parties’ briefs, the relevant case law, and the record
on appeal, we rely on the cogent and comprehensive September 6, 2022,
opinion authored by the Honorable David L. Ashworth, President Judge of the
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Court of Common Pleas of Lancaster County, to affirm Appellant’s judgment
of sentence. See Post-Sentence Motions Opinion, 9/6/22, at 3-14 (finding
verdict supported by sufficient evidence), 16-21 (imposing consecutively-run
sentences in the aggravated guideline range did not reflect an abuse of
discretion where the trial court explained its reasons for doing so on the
record, which included, inter alia: Appellant’s “utter fail[ure]” to acknowledge
his guilt or indicate he acted inappropriately; his persistent blaming of
everyone else but himself; his disturbing conduct in stalking his neighbors
after the harassment conviction; his filing of complaints against his neighbors
with the Attorney General’s Office, who quickly cleared the neighbors of any
wrongdoing; writing post-trial letters to the court and the district attorney
seeking re-litigation and including private information about his neighbors,
deemed inappropriate “deep digging” by the Commonwealth and the trial
court; and maintaining an obsessive attitude toward his neighbors that
justified the present sentence as an attempt to mitigate the possibility of
immediate retaliation against the family; and Appellant was not entitled to a
volume discount for his separate criminal acts).
We instruct the parties to attach a copy of President Judge Ashworth’s
decision in the event of further proceedings in the matter.
Judgment of sentence affirmed.
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Judgment Entered.
Joseph D. Seletyn, Esq.
Prothonotary
Date: 09/26/2023
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