Noel v. James

• Decision Date: 10 March 2022
• Docket Number: 20200565-CA
• Parties: Michael Earl NOEL, Appellee, v. William Thomas JAMES, Appellant.
• Court: Utah Court of Appeals

507 P.3d 832

Michael Earl NOEL, Appellee,

v.William Thomas JAMES, Appellant.

No. 20200565-CA

Court of Appeals of Utah.

Filed March 10, 2022

William Thomas James, Appellant Pro Se

Frank D. Mylar, Attorney for Appellee

Judge Diana Hagen authored this Opinion, in which Judges Jill M. Pohlman and Ryan D. Tenney concurred.

Opinion

HAGEN, Judge:

¶1 To obtain a civil stalking injunction, a petitioner must establish by a preponderance of the evidence that the alleged stalker's "course of conduct ... would cause a reasonable person: (a) to fear for the person's own safety or the safety of a third person; or (b) to suffer other emotional distress." Utah Code Ann. § 76-5-106.5(2) (LexisNexis Supp. 2021); see id. §§ 78B-7-102(21), -701(1), -701(5). In this case, the district court granted a stalking injunction against Appellant William James, but it made no finding as to whether James's course of conduct would have caused a reasonable person in Appellee Michael Noel's position to fear for his safety or suffer emotional distress. Because the basis for the injunction is not apparent in the record, we vacate the injunction and remand for additional proceedings consistent with this opinion.

BACKGROUND¹

¶2 Noel sought a stalking injunction after he and James were kicked out of a Kanab City Council meeting. Noel is an experienced public official who previously served as a state legislator for sixteen years and now serves as the executive director of the Kane County Water Conservancy District. James is a member of a local conservancy group. Both had attended the meeting to give public comment on a controversial permitting issue.

¶3 Noel "got up and got in line" once the comment period opened. James then "got up from the corner" and joined Noel in line. As Noel later testified, "[James] came right at me in kind of a burly manner ... requiring me to move over for him to get by in an intimidating way. ... I'm not saying I was fearful, but he came at me and forced me" to move aside. "If I wouldn't have moved, he would have banged into me."

¶4 While waiting in line, Noel decided he wanted to be the last person to address the council. Accordingly, he left his place in line and moved to the back. James, however, "wanted to prevent [Noel] from having the last word on [him]"—so he, too, gave up his spot and moved to the back of the line. Noel eventually gave up waiting in line altogether. But when he turned to leave, James stood in his way "to stop [Noel] from getting behind" him once again. And so Noel and James "jockeyed" for a few moments, with Noel unable to get past James and James unwilling to let Noel through. Noel testified,

I wanted him to get out of the way, and he was blocking me, and it did anger me to do that. But I was also wondering if there was going to be a confrontation here. I was actually fearful that he might, you know, ... take a shot at me.

¶5 Noel called James "a worthless piece of garbage." James, in turn, shouted to the audience, relaying what Noel had just called him. At this point, law enforcement intervened and asked both men to leave the meeting. Noel went home, and James was arrested after he refused to comply. At the encouragement of the chief of police, Noel later petitioned for a civil stalking injunction against James.

¶6 The district court held a full-day evidentiary hearing on the petition. At the hearing, James sought to admit videos of both the city council meeting and a chamber of commerce meeting earlier that day through a witness who had attended both meetings. The videos had not been previously disclosed.

¶7 When the issue first arose, the court and counsel for both parties were under the impression that there were only two videos—one of the chamber of commerce meeting recorded by the witness herself and one of the city council meeting recorded by a videographer hired by the conservancy group. Noel stipulated to the admission of the first video, but he objected to the second video because the videographer was not present to lay foundation. Specifically, Noel's counsel explained, "If there's a woman here [who] says she videoed this on her camera, and it accurately depicts what she videoed on her camera, and she was there at the meeting, and she's subject to cross-examination, and she made the video, I think that that's proper. But the other one I don't."

¶8 But when the witness was called to testify, she explained that there were actually three videos: one video from each of the two meetings that she recorded with her personal cell phone, and a third video from the city council meeting recorded by the videographer. At that point, Noel's counsel objected to the admission of all three videos because they had not been disclosed and he was "surprised" that they were being offered as evidence. James's counsel did not dispute that the videos had not been disclosed in advance but claimed that, when the matter was discussed earlier, Noel "had stipulated to anything that [the witness] had personally recorded." In response, Noel's counsel argued that he had merely stipulated to the chamber of commerce video: "That's all we were discussing at the time." The court agreed with Noel's counsel that the stipulation was limited to the chamber of commerce video. And because Noel "didn't make the objection before about not having [the chamber of commerce video] in advance," the court held him to that stipulation. The court received the chamber of commerce video into evidence per the stipulation, but excluded the other two based on the objection.

¶9 At the conclusion of the hearing, the district court determined that James had engaged in a course of conduct directed at Noel, as required under the civil stalking statute. The court found that the course of conduct consisted of two component acts, each committed at the city council meeting: (1) when James approached Noel "in a kind of burly manner," and (2) when James "blocked [Noel] from going back to his seat." The court did not make an express finding that James's conduct would cause a reasonable person in Noel's circumstances to fear for his safety or suffer emotional distress. Nonetheless, the court granted the requested stalking injunction.

ISSUES AND STANDARDS OF REVIEW

¶10 James now appeals, contending that the district court erred in imposing a civil stalking injunction against him.² James primarily argues that his course of conduct would not have caused a reasonable person in Noel's circumstances to fear for his safety or suffer emotional distress. Although the question of whether "a reasonable person would suffer fear or emotional distress" under the circumstances "is a question of fact that we review for clear error, we review the district court's interpretation [and application] of the underlying legal standard for correctness." Ragsdale v. Fishler , 2021 UT 29, ¶ 16, 491 P.3d 835 ; see also Baird v. Baird , 2014 UT 08, ¶ 16, 322 P.3d 728 ("The proper interpretation and application of a statute is a question of law which we review for correctness, affording no deference to the district court's legal conclusion." (cleaned up)).

¶11 James also challenges the district court's decision to exclude video evidence of the city council meeting. Specifically, he contends that the "videos met the [parties’] stipulation for new video evidence" and that, therefore, the district court erred by excluding them. "The scope of a stipulation presents a question of fact, which we review for clear error." Fuller v. Bohne , 2017 UT App 28, ¶ 9, 392 P.3d 898 (cleaned up).

ANALYSIS

I. Civil Stalking Injunction

¶12 To obtain a civil stalking injunction, the petitioner "must prove by a preponderance of the evidence that ‘an offense of stalking has occurred.’ " Ragsdale v. Fishler , 2021 UT 29, ¶ 25, 491 P.3d 835 (quoting Utah Code Ann. § 77-3a-101(7) (LexisNexis 2017)).³ "The crime of stalking consists of two elements. First, a person must ‘intentionally or knowingly engage in a course of conduct directed at a specific person.’ " Id. (cleaned up) (quoting Utah Code Ann. § 76-5-106.5(2) (LexisNexis 2017)). By statute, a " ‘[c]ourse of conduct’ means two or more acts directed at or toward a specific person." Utah Code Ann. § 76-5-106.5(1)(a) (LexisNexis Supp. 2021) (listing several examples of qualifying acts). Second, the respondent "must ‘know or should know that the course of conduct would cause a reasonable person’ to ‘fear for the person's own safety’ or ‘suffer other emotional distress.’ " Ragsdale , 2021 UT 29, ¶ 25, 491 P.3d 835 (quoting Utah Code Ann. § 76-5-106.5(2) ). A "reasonable person" is statutorily defined as "a reasonable person in the victim's circumstances." § 76-5-106.5(1)(d).

¶13 Although the district court recited both elements, it made findings on the first element only. It identified an intentional course of conduct consisting of two acts: approaching Noel in a "burly manner" and later blocking Noel from returning to his seat. But the court did not make a factual finding on the second element, that is, whether James knew or should have known that his course of conduct would have caused a reasonable person in Noel's circumstances to fear for his safety or suffer emotional distress. "When confronted with questions of fact, this court will only rule as a matter of law if the evidence is so clear and persuasive that all reasonable minds would find one way." See Baird v. Baird , 2014 UT 08, ¶ 29, 322 P.3d 728 (cleaned up). Otherwise, "remand is appropriate" to allow the district court to make that determination. See id.

¶14 Noel acknowledges that the district court never addressed the second element on the record, but he argues that James failed to preserve the issue for appeal. We disagree. To issue a stalking injunction, "the district court necessarily had to consider whether [Noel] had established each element of a stalking offense." See id. ¶ 20. Thus, the court had an opportunity to rule on whether the statutory elements were met, and that issue is "adequately...