People v. Poindexter

• Decision Date: 20 June 2013
• Docket Number: Court of Appeals No. 09CA0434
• Citation: 338 P.3d 352,2013 COA 93
• Parties: The PEOPLE of the State of Colorado, Plaintiff–Appellee, v. Craig Lamonte POINDEXTER, Defendant–Appellant.
• Court: Colorado Court of Appeals

338 P.3d 352

2013 COA 93

The PEOPLE of the State of Colorado, Plaintiff–Appellee

v.Craig Lamonte POINDEXTER, Defendant–Appellant.

Court of Appeals No. 09CA0434

Colorado Court of Appeals, Div. VII.

Announced June 20, 2013

John W. Suthers, Attorney General, John D. Seidel, Senior Assistant Attorney General, Denver, Colorado, for Plaintiff–Appellee.

Douglas K. Wilson, Colorado State Public Defender, Adam Mueller, Deputy State Public Defender, Denver, Colorado, for Defendant–Appellant.

Opinion

Opinion by JUDGE BERNARD

¶ 1 In Colorado, a person commits the crime of second degree burglary if that person illegally enters the dwelling of another with the intent to commit therein a crime against another person or property. § 18–4–203(1), C.R.S.2012. This appeal presents the issue whether the crime of obstructing a peace officer, § 18–8–104(1)(a), C.R.S.2012, qualifies as a crime against another person or property. We conclude that, under the circumstances here, it does not. As a result, we reverse and vacate the conviction and sentence of defendant, Craig Lamonte Poindexter, for burglary.

¶ 2 Defendant also appeals the judgment of conviction and sentence entered on the jury verdicts finding him guilty of first degree aggravated motor vehicle theft, vehicular eluding, obstructing a peace officer, and two habitual criminal counts. We affirm the judgments and sentences as to those counts.

I. Background

¶ 3 Defendant and another man accosted a woman and stole her car. Defendant drove the car while police officers gave chase. Eventually, defendant leapt from the moving car. He ran to an apartment building, and he broke into the building to hide from the police.

¶ 4 After defendant was convicted, and after the trial court found beyond a reasonable doubt that defendant had twice previously been convicted of felonies, the trial court sentenced him to (1) concurrent eighteen-year prison terms for aggravated motor vehicle theft and second degree burglary; and (2) a nine-year prison term for vehicular eluding, a six-month term for obstructing a peace officer, and a six-month term for criminal mischief, which were all to be served concurrently with the sentences for aggravated motor vehicle theft and second degree burglary.

II. Analysis

A. The Burglary Conviction Must Be Vacated

¶ 5 Defendant contends that his conviction for second degree burglary must be vacated because it was based on a crime, obstructing a peace officer, that was not a crime against another person or property. Under the circumstances of this case, we agree.

¶ 6 We review this issue de novo because it involves the interpretation of statutes. Hendricks v. People, 10 P.3d 1231, 1235 (Colo.2000). When interpreting a statute, our goal is to determine, and then give effect to, the legislature's intent. People v. Hickman, 988 P.2d 628, 634 (Colo.1999). We begin with the statutory language itself, giving words and phrases their plain meanings. People v. Novitskiy, 81 P.3d 1070, 1073 (Colo.App.2003). We read the statute as a whole, and we do so in a way that gives consistent and sensible effect to all the statute's parts. Devora v. Strodtman, 2012 COA 87, ¶ 9, 282 P.3d 528. We avoid constructions that lead to absurd results. Town of Erie v. Eason, 18 P.3d 1271, 1276 (Colo.2001).

¶ 7 As relevant here, section 18–4–203(1) provides that

[a] person commits second degree burglary, if the person knowingly breaks an entrance into [or] enters unlawfully in ... a building or occupied structure with intent to commit therein a crime against another person or property .

(Emphasis supplied.)

¶ 8 Here, the prosecution charged that defendant burglarized an apartment building with the intent to commit therein the crime of obstructing a peace officer under section 18–8–104(1)(a). That section provides:

A person commits obstructing a peace officer ... when, by using or threatening to use violence, force, physical interference, or an obstacle, such person knowingly obstructs, impairs, or hinders the enforcement of the penal law or the preservation of the peace by a peace officer, acting under color of his or her official authority....

¶ 9 Defendant argues that obstructing a peace officer is not “a crime against [a] person or property” but is, instead, an offense against governmental operations. Accordingly, he asserts, obstructing a peace officer does not fall within the class of crimes designated by the legislature as possible predicates to burglary because it is not a crime against another person or property.

¶ 10 The prosecution contends that obstructing a peace officer constitutes a crime against a person—the peace officer—because it threatens the officer's person, and is, therefore, a proper basis for a conviction of second degree burglary. Under the circumstances of this case, we agree with defendant.

1. Definitions and Common Law Principles

¶ 11 The General Assembly has not defined the term “crime against a person.” However, Black's Law Dictionary provides the following definitions that aid our analysis. And the General Assembly has stated that the terms “crime” and “offense” are synonymous under Colorado law. § 18–1–104(1), C.R.S.2012.

[C]rimes against persons. A category of criminal offenses in which the perpetrator uses or threatens to use force. Examples include murder, rape, aggravated assault, and robbery.

Black's Law Dictionary 401 (8th ed. 2004).

[O]ffense against the person. A crime against the body of another human being. The common-law offenses against the person were murder, manslaughter, mayhem, rape, assault, battery, robbery, false imprisonment, abortion, seduction, kidnapping, and abduction.

Id. at 1112.

Black's also defines “crimes against property” as

[a] category of criminal offenses in which the perpetrator seeks to derive an unlawful benefit from—or do damage to—another's property without the use or threat of force. Examples include burglary, theft, and arson (even though arson may result in injury or death ).

Id. at 401 (emphasis added).

¶ 12 Under this definition of a “crime against property,” the fact that an offense carries a risk of physical harm to a person does not necessarily establish that the offense is a “crime against a person.”

¶ 13 An “offense against public justice and authority” is

[a] crime that impairs the administration of justice. The common-law offenses of this type were obstruction of justice, barratry, maintenance, champerty, embracery, escape, prison breach, rescue, misprision of felony, compounding a crime, subornation of perjury, bribery, and misconduct in office.

Id. at 1112.

¶ 14 Many of the offenses that are included in this last definition involve misconduct against another person who is acting in an official capacity or otherwise performing a public function. Yet the offense is not classified as a “crime against a person.” For example, at common law, the crime of obstruction of justice was defined as

[i]nterference with the orderly administration of law and justice, as by giving false information to or withholding evidence from a police officer or prosecutor, or by harming or intimidating a witness or juror.

Id. at 1107.

¶ 15 Thus, at common law, obstruction of justice could be based on harming or intimidating a witness or juror—a person. Yet it was not an offense against that person. Rather, it was an offense against public justice and authority.

2. The Model Penal Code and Its Adoption in Colorado

¶ 16 The offense of burglary evolved to address two deficiencies in the early law of attempt. Cooper v. People, 973 P.2d 1234, 1237 (Colo.1999), disapproved of on other grounds by Griego v. People, 19 P.3d 1 (Colo.2001).

First, under the common law, attempt required a person to engage in a final act that would have accomplished the crime but for circumstances beyond that person's control. The development of burglary allowed the law to intercede in a prospective felon's conduct at an earlier point in time, combating what was viewed to be “a very heinous offense: not only because of the abundant terror that it naturally carries with it, but also as it is a forcible invasion and disturbance of [the] right of habitation.”

Id. (citation omitted) (citing Model Penal Code § 221.1, cmt. at 63 (1980); and quoting 4 Blackstone, Commentaries 282).

¶ 17 Second, burglary “provide[d] more severe punishment for a particularly terrifying form of inchoate offense.” Id . at 1237–38 (citing Model Penal Code § 221.1, cmt. at 63; 4 Blackstone at 281).

¶ 18 The Model Penal Code corrected these deficiencies. Nonetheless, burglary continues as a separate offense, in part because “the maintenance of a crime of burglary reflects a considered judgment that especially severe sanctions are appropriate for criminal invasion of premises under circumstances likely to terrorize occupants.” Model Penal Code § 221.1, cmt. at 63.

¶ 19 The Model Penal Code expanded the definition of burglary. Under the common law, a criminal intent to steal or commit a felony within the premises was an essential element of the crime of burglary. Under the Model Penal Code, the purpose element was expanded to include any crime. See Model Penal Code § 221.1.

¶ 20 Colorado adopted a modified version of the Model Penal Code in 1971. However, Colorado's statute limits the class of crimes that can serve as predicates to burglary. Rather than any crime, only an intent to commit “a crime against another person or property” will support a conviction for second degree burglary. § 18–4–203(1).

3. Other Jurisdictions

¶ 21 Courts in two states, Connecticut and Washington, have addressed whether obstructing a peace officer can serve as a predicate to burglary.

¶ 22 In State v. Wallace, 56 Conn.App. 730, 745 A.2d 216, 219 (2000), the Connecticut Appellate Court determined that interfering with an officer properly qualified as a predicate offense for burglary. However, because Connecticut law provides that burglary may be predicated on any crime, see Conn. Gen.Stat. § 53a–103 (2012), that decision does not aid our analysis.

¶ 23 Like Colorado,...