Following a jury trial, Sean Burke was found guilty of aggravated stalking based on a single contact that he made with Elaine Bolton in violation of an earlier protective order. The Court of Appeals reversed Burke’s conviction, finding that, because the State’s entire prosecution was based on a single violation of the protective order, and because a single violation of a protective order does not, in and of itself, establish a pattern of harassing and intimidating conduct, the State had not proven that Burke was guilty of aggravated stalking. See Burke v. State , 297 Ga. App. 38 676 SE2d 766 2009. This Court granted certiorari in this case to determine whether the Court of Appeals erred in reversing the judgment of the trial court. For the reasons that follow, we affirm. The record reveals that, after the relationship between Burke and Bolton ended in 2001, Burke continued to contact and follow Bolton over the course of the next two years. On August 27, 2003, Bolton obtained a temporary protective order in an attempt to prevent Burke from stalking her. After a September 10, 2003 evidentiary hearing, the trial court entered a twelve-month stalking protective order that contained an express “no contact” provision. While Burke stayed physically away from Bolton after this, he mailed her over fifty letters. Burke was arrested, and while he was in jail and awaiting trial, he called and mailed letters and gifts to Bolton. Burke pleaded guilty to one count of stalking and two counts of aggravated stalking. He was sentenced to ten years with thirty months to serve, and the trial court issued a permanent protective order, which expressly prohibited Burke from having “any contact whatsoever of any nature” with Bolton.
Approximately fifteen months later, Burke contacted Bolton by sending her an envelope containing a card, a letter, and a handwritten poem. Burke was then indicted and tried for the one count of aggravated stalking at issue in this case. In connection with the trial on this particular count of aggravated stalking, however, the State specifically argued that it only had to prove Burke’s single violation of the permanent protective order in order to for the jury to find him guilty of the crime charged. Moreover, the jury was specifically instructed that the evidence of prior difficulties between Burke and Bolton that had been presented at the trial could only be considered for the limited purpose of illustrating “the state of feeling between the defendant and the alleged victim and the bent of mind and the course of conduct on the part of the accused” and “not . . . for any other purpose.” See, e.g., O’Toole v. State , 258 Ga. 614, 617 6 373 SE2d 12 1988 evidence of prior difficulties is admissible “for a limited purpose on the question of the defendant’s conduct, bent of mind, motive, scheme, purpose, or intent to commit the crime with which he was charged”. Thus, the evidence of prior difficulties could not be considered as evidence of a pattern of behavior by Burke towards Bolton that would support the “pattern” element of aggravated stalking, and the State’s entire case hinged on the theory that a single violation of a protective order, in and of itself, was sufficient to establish the crime of aggravated stalking.
