Maryland Appellate Court: False statement on sexual abuse

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Criminal; false statement

BOTTOM LINE: Where it was not unreasonable for the jury to find the mother coached a minor child into making false allegations of sexual abuse against her father when she was only one; continued to talk to her about the allegations against the express instructions of Child Protective Service social workers and subjected her to three unnecessary forensic interviews and an unwarranted forensic medical examination, mother’s conviction for contributing to a condition rendering a child in need of assistance was affirmed.

CASE: Gambino v. State, No.0349, Sept. Term, 2024 (filed March 17, 2026) (Judges NAZARIAN, Beachley, Harrell).

FACTS: Jasmine Leah Gambino, a licensed clinical social worker, is the mother of R., a minor child. Between March 25 and May 10, 2023, Ms. Gambino reported multiple times, to multiple people, that R was disclosing instances of sexual abuse by her father, T.

She also filed for a protective order against T on R’s behalf; took R for three forensic interviews and she brought R in for a forensic medical examination. After Child Protective Services, or CPS, investigated these reports and determined they were unfounded, Ms. Gambino was charged with, and convicted by a jury of making a false statement to law enforcement and contributing to a condition rendering a child in need of assistance.

LAW: The state charged Ms. Gambino under Md. Code, § 9-501 of the Criminal Law Article on the grounds that at her May 10 meeting with Ms. Lee and Detective Altshuler, she showed Detective Altshuler what she claimed was video evidence of R making new disclosures of abuse with the intent to deceive him and cause him to reopen his investigation into T.

Ms. Gambino argues that the evidence was insufficient to convict her of this charge because she made the offending statement to Ms. Lee, a social worker, and not to Detective Altshuler, a law enforcement officer. But even if Detective Altshuler was acting only as an “observer,” that didn’t negate his presence at the meeting or Ms. Gambino’s awareness of his presence when she played the videos. The jury was in the best position to decide how much weight to give Ms. Gambino’s testimony about her intent when presenting the videos at the interview.

Ms. Gambino next argues that the state put forward insufficient evidence to sustain her conviction for contributing to a condition rendering a child in need of assistance, or CINA, under Md. Cod, § 3-828 of the Courts & Judicial Proceedings Article. The court disagrees. Based on the entire body of evidence presented by the state, it was not unreasonable for the jury to find that Ms. Gambino coached R into making false allegations of sexual abuse against her father as early as 2019, when R was only one; continued to talk to R about the allegations against the express instructions of CPS social workers; started arguments with T in front of R accusing him of sexual abuse and subjected R to three unnecessary forensic interviews and an unwarranted forensic medical examination.

Ms. Gambino contends next that the circuit court erred when it denied her motion to suppress evidence, including videos and text messages, obtained by police through a search of her cell phone. The court disagrees. Exigent circumstances justified the warrantless seizure of Ms. Gambino’s cellphone — to prevent the deletion or alteration of that evidence before a search warrant could be obtained.

Second, the 21-day delay between the initial seizure of her phone and the issuance and execution of the search warrant was not unreasonable under the circumstances. Third, although the police exceeded the scope of the search warrant issued on May 31, which authorized the seizure of content with associated dates between March 10, 2023, and May 10, 2023, when officers seized a video created in September 2019, the good faith exception to the exclusionary rule applies.

Next, the court finds that the circuit court did not err in allowing Detective Altshuler to testify as to why he closed his investigation into T. His testimony did not “encroach[] on the jury’s function to judge the credibility of the witnesses and weigh their testimony” or “to resolve contested facts.” And this was not a case where the prosecution indicated to the jury that Detective Altshuler’s testimony was conclusive on the issue of the truth or falsity of Ms. Gambino’s reports against T or that the jury should substitute Detective Altshuler’s judgment for its own.

The court also concludes that the circuit court did not violate Maryland’s Wiretap Act by admitting a recording of a fight between T and Ms. Gambino. Because she knew T was recording and didn’t take any steps to prevent him from intercepting her words, Ms. Gambino “fairly may be understood to [have] tacitly consent[ed] to” the interception.

Finally, the circuit court did not abuse its discretion when it denied Ms. Gambino’s motion for a new trial based on new evidence that Ms. Rodriguez provided inaccurate information in other CPS investigations or when it quashed her subpoena to CPS. The newly discovered evidence is “merely impeaching” and would not have been material to the outcome of her case. Even if the newly discovered evidence of Ms. Rodriguez’s alleged misconduct was material, the circuit court didn’t abuse its discretion by deciding that there was not a “substantial or significant possibility” that it would have affected the jury’s verdict.

Judgment of the Circuit Court for Montgomery County affirmed.