Temporary Suspension Imposed
The Pennsylvania Supreme Court granted a joint motion for a temporary suspension.
Reading Eagle reported
A Berks County lawyer faces child pornography charges after a member of his household discovered a pen camera that was used to covertly record a girl about 10 years ago as she disrobed to shower.
Roarke T. Aston, 43, Exeter Township, remained free after his May 3 arraignment before District Judge Sandra Fegley.
Aston faces three counts each of child pornography and intimidating, retaliating or obstructing a child abuse report or investigation, six counts of invasion of privacy and one count of criminal use of a communication facility.
Separately, Aston faces drunken-driving charges from Exeter police.
Law enforcement involvement in both matters arose from a domestic quarrel one evening in April, investigators said.
According to the criminal complaint:
Exeter police were called to Aston’s home about 9:30 p.m. on April 19 for a report of child abuse. The complainant said she threw Aston out of the house and that he was intoxicated.
About 20 minutes later, police said, Sgt. Sean Fullerton observed Aston arrive in his car and park a few houses away from his home.
Fullerton called for assistance from another officer. Officer Anthony Pendell arrived and made contact with Roarke, who had an odor of alcohol on his breath. Roarke was placed into custody for suspicion of DUI after failing a field sobriety test. He consented to a breath test. It registered a blood alcohol content of 0.158%, which is nearly twice the legal limit for driving.
Meanwhile, another officer spoke with the woman who reported the abuse allegations.
The woman said she and Aston argued that evening and he left the residence. She began to pack up his belongings.
While packing his clothes, she felt objects in an article of clothing and discovered two covert camera-pens, four micro-SD data storage cards and a user manual for the pen cameras.
While viewing the contents of one of the SD cards on a device, she observed a girl, who is known to her, in the nude in a bathroom.
Exeter police turned over the investigation to county detectives, who obtained sealed search warrants from a Berks judge to conduct forensic examinations of the devices.
Digital videos were recovered by a computer forensic examiner. One of the videos depicted a nude girl exiting a shower and toweling off. Another showed the defendant in the bathroom setting up the recording device in the bathroom just before the girl is seen utilizing the shower.
He is then seen at the end of the video returning to the bathroom to remove the camera.
Since the video had no time stamp, Investigators asked the complainant to estimate when it was recorded. She told them it was recorded prior to December 2013, when the girl was no older than 12.
According to Aston’s biography posted on the website of his law firm, Aston Law, he was employed by Berks County as an assistant public defender from 2009 to 2022 and has continued to represent some publicly funded clients on a contractual basis. Aston was co-chair of the Berks County Bar Association’s criminal law section from 2017 to 2022.
Aston couldn’t be reached by phone at his law firm for comment because the voice mail box was full.
(Mike Frisch)