Copeland v. People

• Decision Date: 30 May 2000
• Docket Number: No. 98SC756.,98SC756.
• Citation: 2 P.3d 1283
• Parties: Steven Scott COPELAND, Petitioner, v. The PEOPLE of the State of Colorado, Respondent.
• Court: Colorado Supreme Court

2 P.3d 1283

Steven Scott COPELAND, Petitioner, v. The PEOPLE of the State of Colorado, Respondent.

No. 98SC756.

Supreme Court of Colorado, En Banc.

May 30, 2000.

As Modified on Denial of Rehearing June 12, 2000.¹

David Kaplan, Colorado State Public Defender, Katherine Brien, Deputy State Public Defender, Denver, Colorado, Attorneys, for Petitioner.

Ken Salazar, Attorney General, Barbara McDonnell, Chief Deputy Attorney General, Alan J. Gilbert, Solicitor General, Robert Mark Russel, First Assistant Attorney General, Eric V. Field, Special Assistant Attorney General, Criminal Enforcement Section, Julia A. Thomas, Assistant Attorney General, Appellate Division, Denver, Colorado, Attorneys for Respondent.

Justice HOBBS delivered the Opinion of the Court.

Colorado's fourth degree arson statute provides that a person who "knowingly or recklessly starts or maintains a fire . . . on his own property or that of another, and by so doing places another in danger of death or serious bodily injury" commits a felony. § 18-4-105, 6 C.R.S. (1999). We granted certiorari to determine whether the mens rea requirement of this statute applies to the phrase "and by so doing places another in danger of death or serious bodily injury."² We agree with the trial court and the court of appeals that it does not. Accordingly, we uphold the judgment of the court of appeals affirming the conviction of Steven Scott Copeland (Copeland). See People v. Copeland, 976 P.2d 334 (Colo.App.1998).

I.

In the early morning hours of May 1, 1996, a witness observed a person setting fire to a Porsche within a fenced-in car lot at a repair shop in Colorado Springs. Firefighters responded. They allowed the Porsche to continue burning because water can interact with the magnesium in a Porsche's engine block to intensify the fire and cause metal slag to fly into the air. The fire also damaged two nearby vehicles. The Porsche belonged to Poppy Miller (Miller). On the same night as the fire, someone slashed the tires of Miller's Jeep, which was parked in front of her home.

At trial, Miller testified that Copeland had been a guest in her home the previous summer. Miller asked him to leave following an altercation during which he threatened her. Witnesses placed Copeland at the scene of the fire, and an evidentiary expert matched a knife found in his pocket the night of his arrest with the cuts on the tires of Miller's Jeep. Another witness said Copeland told her on the night of the fire that he needed to leave town because he had just "torched" a Porsche.

The trial court delivered the standard jury instruction for fourth degree arson.³ During deliberations, the jury sent the following inquiry to the court:

In the 4th degree arson charge does the clause "knowingly or recklessly" apply only to the 3rd element or do the words "by doing so" in the 5th element imply that they apply there also. Therefore that would mean that the person would have to knowingly or recklessly put people in danger of death or serious bodily injury.

In response, the court replied that the words, "knowingly or recklessly," applied to the third element listed in Instruction 12.⁴

The jury subsequently found Copeland guilty of two class four felonies: second degree arson, section 18-4-103(1), 6 C.R.S. (1996), and fourth degree arson, section 18-4-105(2), 6 C.R.S. (1996). In addition, the court found Copeland guilty of six habitual criminal counts under section 16-13-101, 6 C.R.S. (1996), and sentenced him to twenty-four years on each of the first two counts, the sentences to run concurrently. Copeland appealed. The court of appeals held that the trial court did not err in its comment to the jury regarding the fourth degree arson instruction. We agree. We reject Copeland's argument that the legislature intended to apply the mens rea requirement to the statute's endangerment provisions.

II.

We hold that the mens rea requirement of the fourth degree arson statute, knowingly or recklessly, does not apply to the statute's endangerment provisions.

A. Construction of Fourth Degree Arson Statute

The common law defined arson as the "wilful and malicious burning of the dwelling house of another." See vol. 3, Charles E. Torca, Wharton's Criminal Law § 337, at 330-31 (15th ed.1995). The rationale for punishment focused on the "contempt for human life" that the offense displayed. Consequently, arson was usually punished as a felony. See id. § 337, at 325. At common law, "every burning" was presumed accidental, thus the burden was on the prosecution to show that it was "wilful and malicious." Id. § 337, at 331. The requisite mental state could be inferred from the "attendant circumstances, from prior threats or quarrels, or from prior burnings or prior attempts to burn." Id. § 337, at 331-32.

In 1971, Colorado enacted its fourth degree arson statute. See ch. 121, art. 4, § 40-4-105, 1971 Sess. Laws 382, 426. The statute punished arson endangering a person as a felony, and arson endangering only property as a misdemeanor:

Fourth degree arson. (1) A person who starts or maintains a fire or causes an explosion on his own property or that of another, and by so doing places another in danger of death or serious bodily injury or places any building or occupied structure of another in danger of damage, commits fourth degree arson. (2) Fourth degree arson is a class 4 felony if a person is thus endangered. (3) Fourth degree arson is a class 2 misdemeanor if only property is thus endangered and the value of the property is one hundred dollars or more. (4) Fourth degree arson is a class 3 misdemeanor if only property is thus endangered and the value of such property is less than one hundred dollars.

See id. (emphasis added).

Based on this wording, we held that fourth degree arson was a strict liability crime because the statute, as enacted in 1971, did not require a culpable mental state. See People v. Garcia, 189 Colo. 347, 351, 541 P.2d 687, 690 (1975). In 1977, the General Assembly amended the statute to insert the words "knowingly or recklessly" between the words "who" and "starts or maintains a fire." This is the only change the legislature has made to the fourth degree arson statute. See § 18-4-105, 6 C.R.S. (1999). The power to define criminal conduct and to establish the legal components of criminal liability is vested in the General Assembly. See Colo. Const. art. V, § 1; Rowe v. People, 856 P.2d 486, 490 (Colo. 1993). In construing a statute, we give effect to the intent of the General Assembly whenever possible. See People v. Williams, 984 P.2d 56, 61 (Colo.1999). With the exception of strict liability crimes, a person is not subject to criminal sanctions unless the prosecution establishes that, in addition to committing a proscribed act, the person acted with the culpable mental state required for the particular crime. See People v. Hall, 999 P.2d 207, 216 (Colo.2000).

Elements of a particular offense may have differing mens rea requirements. Section 18-1-503 provides that:

(4) When a statute defining an offense prescribes as an element thereof a specified culpable mental state, that mental state is deemed to apply to every element of the offense unless an intent to limit its application clearly appears.

§ 18-1-503, 6 C.R.S. (1999) (emphasis added); see also Wayne LaFave & Austin Scott, Criminal Law § 3.4(7) (2nd ed.1986).

In this case, we must determine whether the General Assembly intended by its 1977 amendment to apply the mens rea requirement to the endangerment provisions of the fourth degree arson statute. After the 1977 amendment, in comparing the fourth degree arson statute to the incendiary device statute, we said:

The mental state required for fourth degree arson is that the fire or explosion be started or maintained knowingly or recklessly. The prosecution need not prove intent to endanger the person or building. See People v. Garcia, 189 Colo. 347, 541 P.2d 687 (1975).

People v. Owens, 670 P.2d 1233, 1237 (Colo. 1983).

We adhere to our interpretation of the fourth degree arson statute. The mens rea of a statute may speak to conduct, or to circumstances, or to result, or to any combination thereof, but not necessarily to all three. See Model Penal Code § 2.02 (1999); People v. Baca, 852 P.2d 1302, 1305 (Colo. App.1992). Prior to and after the 1977 amendment, the General Assembly employed the statutory language, "and by so doing places another in danger of death or serious bodily injury" and "fourth degree arson is a class 4 felony if a person is thus endangered," to differentiate the result of the arson from the conduct of "starting or maintaining" the fire. See ch. 224, sec. 21, § 18-4-105, 1977 Sess. Laws. 959, 962-63; ch. 121, art. 4, § 40-4-105, 1971 Sess. Laws 382, 426. The effect of the 1977 amendment was to enunciate the culpability requirement for the conduct portion of the statute, while continuing to hold the arsonist criminally responsible for the endangerment of persons and property that may ensue.

We have recognized that "[a]lthough this distinction between an awareness of one's conduct or circumstance, on the one hand, and an awareness of the result of one's conduct, on the other, at times may be a subtle one, it is a distinction recognized by the Colorado Criminal Code itself." People v. Noble, 635 P.2d 203, 210 (Colo.1981). We held in Garcia that the fourth degree arson statute gives defendants and juries a practical guideline for acceptable behavior, and that fires started accidentally are excluded from the scope of criminal culpability. See Garcia, 189 Colo. at 351-52, 541 P.2d at 689-90 (holding that a voluntary act is required for criminal liability under the fourth degree arson statute and rejecting argument that the statute was unconstitutionally vague or overbroad).

The issue is whether the General Assembly intended to apply any mens rea requirement to the statute's endangerment provisions. We conclude that its retention in 1977 of the...