Deshler v. State, 19863
| Decision Date | 24 April 1990 |
| Docket Number | No. 19863,19863 |
| Citation | 106 Nev. 253,790 P.2d 1001 |
| Parties | David Bryan DESHLER, Appellant, v. The STATE of Nevada, Respondent. |
| Court | Nevada Supreme Court |
This is an appeal from three felony convictions arising out of the theft of a woman's wallet containing money and appellant Deshler's subsequent abusive treatment of the police authorities during arrest, transportation and incarceration. Deshler was sentenced to serve concurrent four year terms for each conviction. For reasons hereinafter stated, we have concluded that Deshler was fairly tried and convicted on each count with the exception of the conviction for intimidation of a public officer, which must be reversed.
During the late evening and early morning hours of October 12th and 13th, 1988, Deshler was patronizing the Tahoe Tavern. A female customer left her seat at the bar to go to the ladies' restroom, momentarily leaving her purse unattended at the foot of her chair. When the woman returned, she picked up her purse and noticed that it felt lighter. While she was looking through the purse to determine what, if anything, was missing, a man she later identified as Deshler came over, put his hand into the purse and took out her address book. She immediately retrieved her address book from Deshler, continued her search of the purse's contents and realized her wallet was missing.
The woman told the bartender about her missing wallet. The bartender, with the help of some patrons, initiated an unsuccessful general search of the premises for the wallet. The address book incident caused the woman to suspect Deshler when she was unable to locate the wallet. She became more suspicious when, a few minutes later, she noticed Deshler standing nearby, conspicuously holding a one hundred dollar bill (one of the bill denominations in the missing wallet). 1
She informed the bartender and the owner of her suspicions and her basis for them. The bartender and owner did a pat down search of Deshler and discovered the missing wallet in the front of his sweatpants. The police were summoned and Deshler was physically prevented from leaving the premises by a patron and one of the owners.
When the police arrived, a bloody Deshler was on the ground outside the bar screaming obscenities and claiming that he was injured. The police, believing Deshler to be injured, summoned the paramedics to care for him. Deshler was placed under arrest while verbally abusing the deputies and fighting or attempting to fight with them, both during and after the arrest.
Concurrent with this scuffle or shortly thereafter, the paramedics arrived. Deshler violently resisted the paramedics' attempts to load him into the ambulance but was eventually placed in the vehicle with the assistance of Deputy Crawford, one of the arresting officers. Deputy Crawford accompanied Deshler in the ambulance during the ride to the hospital. The facts leading to the intimidation charge and conviction arose from Deshler's threats against Crawford in the ambulance. Deshler repeatedly threatened Deputy Crawford in numerous and specific ways, including death threats to him and his family. The seriousness of the threats, their nature and tone were corroborated by the paramedic who was riding in the ambulance with Deshler and Deputy Crawford.
While making the threats, Deshler was also struggling to free himself from the gurney to which he had been fastened by several straps. He eventually managed to break free of the leg restraints and Deputy Crawford thereafter placed his knees on him for the remainder of the trip to keep him under control. Deshler was never able to free himself from the gurney.
Deshler's treatment at the hospital was brief and he was then booked into Douglas County Jail early on the morning of October 13 where he subsequently had another altercation, this time with the guards at the jail. This altercation occurred about ninety minutes after his booking when two deputies took Deshler to the phone area in the jail, where he was allowed to make phone calls. After making some phone calls, Deshler refused to return to his cell peacefully. The deputies asked him several times to return to his cell but a cursing Deshler refused, stating that the deputies were going to have to forcibly put him in his cell if that was where they wanted him. As he made this statement, he assumed an aggressive "karate type" fighting stance and started kicking and swinging at the deputies. The officers, concluding that further conversation was pointless, rushed Deshler, grabbed him, picked him up and carried him back to his cell while he struggled and kicked them. The trial and convictions followed.
In reviewing the legitimacy of the intimidation conviction, we are called upon to interpret NRS 199.300. We conclude that, under the facts of this case, and in light of the statutory language of NRS 199.300, the felony charge and conviction against Deshler were improper and cannot stand.
NRS 199.300 reads:
199.300. Intimidating public officer, juror or referee. Every person who directly or indirectly, addresses any threat or intimidation to a public officer or to a juror, referee, arbitrator, appraiser or assessor, or to any other person authorized by law to hear or determine any controversy or matter, with intent to induce him, contrary to his duty to do or make or to omit or delay any...
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Santana v. State
...of a reasonable person facing the same threat should be the focus of the inquiry. In doing so, we extend our previous holding in Deshler v. State.1 However, the jury instructions were erroneous because the district court did not instruct the jury to apply the reasonable person test. This er......