Jury convicts Altoona man for unlawful contact with minor
Conway found guilty of disseminating explicit material
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HOLLIDAYSBURG -- A city man with an apparent history of targeting juvenile females was convicted Tuesday afternoon of two felony offenses relating to the unlawful contact of a minor in 2023.
After a one-day trial, a Blair County jury of eight men and four women deliberated about 25 minutes before finding Daniel Earnest Conway III, 40, guilty of a single felony count each of disseminating explicit sexual material to a minor and unlawful contact with a minor - obscene and other sexual materials and performances.
The charges were brought after Altoona police, investigating a report relating to Conway, learned the Greenfield Township Police Department had an open case against him involving a 15-year-old girl. Conway was communicating with the victim through Snapchat and sent her an animated picture of a couple in the shower with the caption "shower time," the police report states.
During the first and only day of Conway's jury trial, Assistant District Attorney Nicholas Mays and Chief Public Defender Julia Burke agreed to stipulate to the jury that the Snapchat username mentioned in the police report belonged to Conway.
Mays then called Kimberly Bem to the stand. Bem, a detective with the Blair County District Attorney's Office, stated she became involved in the case in October 2024 when it was sent to her by the Greenfield police. She confirmed that the incident occurred about August 2023, when the victim was 13 years old and Conway was about 32 years old.
On cross-examination, Bem told Burke she had not personally interviewed the witnesses in the case.
When Burke asked Bem about the image that Conway sent the victim, Bem said that the victim clarified in an interview that Conway hadn't implicitly asked her to do anything. Bem also said former Greenfield Police Chief Ronald Sharkey did no investigation in the case and hadn't asked Snapchat to preserve data.
"Snapchat is notoriously difficult to work with," Bem said.
Bem said Sharkey sent a preservation letter to Snapchat, which he was to follow up with a search warrant, but he never did.
While the jury took a comfort break, Burke made a motion for acquittal on both counts against Conway.
Burke told presiding President Judge Wade A. Kagarise that the charges require sexually explicit material be involved, such as nudity or sexual contact. She conceded that the image implied some type of sexual contact but said both people in the image were partially clothed.
"The harmful to minors element is where the count fails," Burke said. "I think clearly it is certainly suggestive but certainly not distinct from common advertising."
"For better or worse it is pervasive in our society," she said. "'Suggestive' does not rise to the level of 'obscene' as a matter of law."
Mays argued that those determinations were for the jury to make, especially when it came to deciding if the material was harmful to minors.
"I believe there is sufficient evidence in the case" to give to the jury for deliberation, Mays said.
Kagarise ultimately ruled on the side of the prosecution, saying he was going to defer the matter to the jury "based on the nature of the allegations" and wording of the statutes.
During her closing arguments, Burke showed the jury Calvin Klein fragrance advertisements she said could also be seen by minors in public places. The models in the advertisements, she argued, were in more of a state of undress than the people in the image Conway sent the victim.
"(Conway) is charged with sending a sexually explicit and obscene photo," Burke said. "He is not charged with being creepy or being flirtatious."
In his closing arguments, Mays told the jury that this was a "straightforward" but "important" case.
"It is about where we, as a society, draw a line," Mays said. "You decide where we draw the line and what that line is."
Once the jury returned with its guilty verdicts and were subsequently released from duty, Mays told Kagarise that Conway would now be a Tier II offender under Megan's Law and would have to undergo an evaluation by the state Sexual Offenders Assessment Board.
Mays then asked for Conway's bail to be revoked pending sentencing. He said the felony count of disseminating explicit sexual material to a minor carried a standard-range sentence of one to 12 months' incarceration, while the unlawful contact with a minor charge carried a standard-range sentence of six to 14 months.
Burke asked that Conway be allowed to remain free pending sentencing, citing the fact that Conway always appeared on time for court dates without issue while free on 10% of $50,000 bail since Jan. 29, 2025.
Kagarise told Mays he wasn't going to revoke Conway's bail but would entertain a hearing to increase his bail or modify his bail conditions.
"I don't see him as being a flight risk at this point," Kagarise said.
Kagarise scheduled Conway for sentencing on Nov. 3.
Jury selection for the three remaining felony charges in the case, which were separated and held in abeyance during the trial, is scheduled for Sept. 14.
Those three felony counts of indecent assault of a person less than 13 years of age were brought after Altoona police were dispatched on Aug. 11, 2024, to a residence along the 100 block of East First Avenue for a report of a past sexual assault called in by the 9-year-old victim's mother.
The victim told her mother that during the winter/spring of 2023-24, she would meet Conway at her two female juvenile friends' house and a park, where Conway would allegedly grope her chest and groin area on multiple occasions, court documents state.
Conway has previously pleaded guilty to corruption of minors on Nov. 2, 2007, and received a sentence to pay fines and costs, as well as a county prison sentence of nine months to one year, the report states.
Mirror Staff Writer Rachel Foor-Musselman is at 814-946-7458.