People v. Agarwal
945 N.Y.S.2d 906
N.Y. App. Div.
2012
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THE PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK, Respondent, v PRASHANT AGARWAL, Appellant.

Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of New York, Fourth Department

945 N.Y.S.2d 906

Appeal from an order of the Cayuga County Court (Mark H. Fandrich, A.J.), dated June 20, 2011.

Appeal from an order of the Cayuga County Court (Mark H. Fandrich, A.J.), dated June 20, 2011. The order determined that defendant is a level two risk pursuant to the Sex Offender Registration Act.

It is hereby ordered that the order so appealed from is unanimously affirmed without costs.

Memorandum: On appeal from an order determining that he is a level two risk pursuant to the Sex Offender Registration Act (Correction Law § 168 et seq.), defendant contends that County Court‘s upward departure from his presumptive classification as a level one risk to a level two risk is not supported by the requisite clear and convincing evidence (see § 168-n [3]). We reject that contention. There is clear and convincing evidence that defendant used the internet to engage in sexually explicit conversations with an undercover police officer posing as a 14-year-old girl, instructed her to masturbate, provided her with Web sites to educate her about sexual positions, communicated to her that he wanted to engage in sexual activity with her, and “exhibited a willingness to act on his compulsions” by arranging to meet with her and then arriving at the arranged meeting with various items demonstrating his intent to engage in sexual activity (, ). In our view, the People thereby presented evidence of aggravating factors “of a kind, or to a degree, not otherwise adequately taken into account by the [risk assessment] guidelines” (, ).

Present—Scudder, P.J., Centra, Peradotto, Carni and Lindley, JJ.