Sufficiency of the evidence; Stalking; MCL 750.411h; Harassment

Concluding that the evidence was sufficient to support defendant-McClellan’s stalking conviction, the court affirmed. After the victim (RT) obtained a PPO against defendant, he contacted her by phone, text message, and e-mail. The court held that the “prosecution presented sufficient evidence to establish that McClellan’s actions constituted a willful course of conduct involving repeated or continuing harassment.” McClellan contended “that although his actions annoyed RT, they would not have caused a reasonable person to suffer emotional distress.” In one of the “text messages sent to RT, he mentioned that he had an AR-15. Another text message was sexually explicit, and several of the messages were nonsensical. In addition to those particularly concerning text messages, McClellan telephoned RT ‘hundreds’ of times between” 3/12/23 and 5/2/23. “The overwhelming amount of unconsented contact and the troubling nature of some of the messages would cause a reasonable person ‘to be subject to great mental strain or difficulties.’” Moreover, the court found that “McClellan failed to rebut the statutory presumption that his continued efforts to contact RT after she obtained a PPO against him caused her ‘to feel terrorized, frightened, intimidated, threatened, harassed, or molested.’” Further, it concluded that “the prosecution presented evidence that RT in fact experienced great mental strain or difficulties as a result of McClellan’s conduct. She testified that she was ‘scared to go anywhere’ and was unable to sleep. She also testified that, after receiving McClellan’s message referencing the AR-15, she felt nervous and scared and was afraid she ‘might get hurt[.]’”