Adams v. United States
| Decision Date | 26 August 1969 |
| Docket Number | No. 4871.,4871. |
| Citation | 256 A.2d 563 |
| Parties | John P. ADAMS, Appellant, v. UNITED STATES, Appellee. |
| Court | D.C. Court of Appeals |
Frank D. Reeves, Washington, D. C., with whom Jack Greenberg and W. Haywood Burns, New York City, were on the brief, for appellant.
John G. Gill, Jr., Asst. U. S. Atty., with whom David G. Bress, U. S. Atty., Frank Q. Nebeker and Daniel Rarris, Asst. U. S. Attys., were on the brief, for appellee.
Before HOOD, Chief Justice, and FICK-LING and KERN, Associate Judges.
Appellant was convicted of violating the provision of D.C.Code 1967, § 22-1107 which forbids persons to congregate and assemble on a public street and crowd, obstruct, or incommode the free use of such street. We conclude that a reversal of the conviction is required by the recent decision of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit in Williams v. District of Columbia, ___ U.S.App.D.C. ___ F.2d ___ (decided June 20, 1969) reversing the decision of this court in Williams v. District of Columbia, 227 A.2d 60 (1967).
In Williams there had been a conviction under another provision of Section 1107 which makes it unlawful for any person to use "profane language or indecent or obscene words" in a public street. Characterizing this section of the Code as "a disorderly conduct statute which has remained virtually unchanged since 1898", the court held that "Section 1107 would require an additional element in order to be constitutional" (___ F.2d at ___), that "Section 1107 could be validly applied only if it were construed to require something more than simply the utterance of profane or obscene language in a public place" (at ___), and that "Section 1107 would not be invalid if the statutory prohibition against profane or obscene language in public were interpreted to require an additional element that the language be spoken in circumstances which threaten a breach of the peace" (at ___).
Without deciding whether the additional element could validly be added by judicial construction, the court ruled that the information was fatally defective in that it did not allege that the words were uttered "under circumstances likely to cause a breach of the peace" (at ___). Accordingly the court ruled that the `information having failed to charge an offense, the conviction founded upon it cannot stand, and the information itself is subject to dismissal" (at ___).
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Agnew v. Gov't of the Dist. of Columbia
...the use of public spaces, for example, or loud or boisterous talking—threaten a breach of the peace. See Adams v. United States , 256 A.2d 563, 564-65 (D.C. 1969). The court feared that, without that limiting construction, the statute could "allow punishment of the members of a group of sig......
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Tetaz v. District of Columbia
...argue that two prior decisions, Williams v. District of Columbia, 136 U.S.App. D.C. 56, 419 F.2d 638 (1969), and Adams v. United States, 256 A.2d 563 (D.C.1969), require the government to prove a breach of the peace. Williams, however, added that proof requirement to the disorderly conduct ......
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Morgan v. District of Columbia
...and Woodard argue that they did not act "under circumstances likely to cause a breach of the peace" and thus that, under Adams v. United States, 256 A.2d 563 (D.C.1969), they committed no § 22-1107 In Adams, supra, this court held that a person could not be charged with incommoding the free......
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Lange v. United States
...assemble on a public street in such a manner as to crowd, obstruct, or incommode the free use of the street." Adams v. United States, 256 A.2d 563, 564-565 (D.C.Ct. App.1969). Appellant therefore presses her claim that the information fails to state an offense, in view of the failure to con......