Salvattera v. Ramirez, 14–FM–1006.

• Decision Date: 26 March 2015
• Docket Number: No. 14–FM–1006.,14–FM–1006.
• Parties: Alfredo SALVATTERA, Appellant, v. Isela RAMIREZ, Appellee.
• Court: D.C. Court of Appeals

111 A.3d 1032

Alfredo SALVATTERA, Appellant

v.Isela RAMIREZ, Appellee.

No. 14–FM–1006.

District of Columbia Court of Appeals.

Argued Feb. 26, 2015.

Decided March 26, 2015.

Stefanie Schneider, Public Defender Service, with whom James Klein and Samia Fam, Public Defender Service, were on the brief, for appellant.

Luke A. Meisner, with whom Gregory B. Craig, Stephen J. Harburg, Donald P. Salzman, Daniele M. Schiffman, Washington, DC, and Rachel L. Jacobs were on the brief, for appellee.

Before GLICKMAN and FISHER, Associate Judges, and STEADMAN, Senior Judge.

Opinion

FISHER, Associate Judge:

Alfredo Salvattera appeals from the issuance of a civil protection order (“CPO”) that directed him to vacate his apartment. He principally contends that the court lacked the statutory authority to issue such an order under the Intrafamily Offenses Act, D.C.Code §§ 16–1001 to –1059 (2012 Repl.). We affirm the trial court's decision.

I. Background

After an evidentiary hearing, Judge Saddler found the following relevant facts.¹ Appellee Isela Ramirez lived on the third floor of a small apartment building in Northwest Washington with her father and her two children. Appellant lived in an apartment on the first floor. The two knew each other because appellant acted as a building manager.

Appellee's father sometimes had trouble paying rent, and on October 26, 2013, appellant sent Ms. Ramirez a text message stating that he wanted to discuss the rent with her father. Two days later, at around 10:00 p.m., she went to appellant's apartment to talk to him about the text message. During the course of their hour-long conversation, appellant gave her three glasses of sangria. Five minutes after drinking part of the third glass, which tasted bitter, she developed a strong stomachache, vomited blood, and passed out.

Ms. Ramirez awoke the next morning in appellant's bed, naked from the waist down. Appellant was standing beside the bed, holding her clothing. When appellee asked him what happened, he said they both got naked and “what had to happen, happened.” He also said that he never did anything to her.

Ms. Ramirez fled the apartment. Later that day, she went to a hospital where she was examined by a nurse and interviewed by the police. The examination found no forensic evidence of sexual assault.

After that night, appellee experienced panic and anxiety attacks whenever she saw appellant. Nonetheless, she continued to live in the building because her father was there and could not be left alone. In January, her father moved out; appellee and her two children later moved to a shelter because she did not feel safe living so close to appellant.

On March 28, 2014, appellee filed a petition for a CPO pursuant to D.C.Code § 16–1005(c), alleging that appellant had sexually assaulted her. The petition requested, among other things, that the court order appellant to vacate his apartment. On August 26, 2014, after nine days of hearings, the trial court granted the petition, ordering appellant not to assault, threaten, harass, or stalk appellee; to stay at least 100 feet away from her; not to contact her; and to vacate his apartment by September 12, 2014.

On September 3, 2014, appellant filed a motion pursuant to D.C.Super. Ct. Civ. R. 59(e) asking the trial court to remove the requirement that he vacate his apartment. That motion was denied. Appellant then timely appealed the CPO. He also filed a motion for a stay, which this court granted on December 15, 2014. See Salvattera v. Ramirez, 105 A.3d 1003, 1009 (D.C.2014).

II. Analysis

A. Authority to Issue the Vacate Order

Appellant contends that the trial court had no authority to order him to vacate his apartment. Judge Saddler specifically addressed that issue when denying his Rule 59(e) motion, first noting that the Intrafamily Offenses Act explicitly authorized the stay-away provision of the protection order. See D.C.Code § 16–1005(c)(2) (2012 Repl.). She then recognized that it would be difficult to enforce the stay-away order because there was only one staircase in the apartment building, and appellee had to come within a few feet of appellant's apartment when going to and from her apartment.

The stay-away provision would therefore be frustrated unless appellant vacated his apartment, and Judge Saddler concluded that ordering him to do so was a valid exercise of authority under the catch-all provision of the statute, D.C.Code 16–1005(c)(11). That provision provides, without elaboration, that a court may “[d]irect[ ] the respondent to perform or refrain from other actions as may be appropriate to the effective resolution of the matter....” D.C.Code § 16–1005(c)(11) (2012 Repl.).

We have long recognized that the Intrafamily Offenses Act “is a remedial statute and as such should be liberally construed for the benefit of the class it is intended to protect.” Maldonado v. Maldonado, 631 A.2d 40, 42 (D.C.1993). Because a protection order “was designed to protect victims of family abuse from acts and threats of violence,” the act “gives the court ‘a wider range of dispositional powers than criminal courts in order to effect rehabilitation rather than retribution.’ ” Cruz–Foster v. Foster, 597 A.2d 927, 929 (D.C.1991) (quoting United States v. Harrison, 149 U.S.App.D.C. 123, 124, 461 F.2d 1209, 1210 (1972) ).

The catch-all and stay-away provisions of the current statute are nearly identical to their counterparts in the original act passed in 1970. Compare District of Columbia Court Reform and Criminal Procedure Act of 1970, Pub.L. No. 91358, § 131(a), 84 Stat. 473, 547 (1970), with D.C.Code § 16–1005(c)(2), (11) (2012 Repl.). At that time, the statute did not explicitly mention ordering a respondent to vacate a dwelling. In 1980, however, Judge Schwelb, then a judge of the Superior Court, opined that “[a]n order excluding [a] husband from the [marital] home would be well within the Court's discretion” under the stay-away provision. LaPrade v. LaPrade, 108 Daily Wash. L. Rptr. 1773, 1779 (Super.Ct.D.C.1980) (citing former D.C.Code § 16–1005(c)(3) (1973)). He also noted that two other judges who handled the same case had come to the same conclusion.Id. Thus, at least some trial judges interpreted the original statute broadly enough to include the authority to issue orders to vacate.

Notwithstanding the LaPrade decision, many critics asserted that the courts were interpreting their statutory power so narrowly that they were not issuing effective protection orders. D.C. Council, Report on Bill 4–195 at 10 (May 12, 1982). In response to that concern, the Council of the District of Columbia, in 1982, added six provisions to the portion of the act describing remedial measures. Id. at 6–7. One of those provisions was D.C.Code § 16–1005(c)(4), which provides that a CPO may “[d]irect[ ] the respondent to refrain from entering, or to vacate, the dwelling unit of the petitioner” if the petitioner has one of four enumerated property interests in the unit. D.C.Code § 16–1005(c)(4) (2012 Repl.).

The committee report on the 1982 bill acknowledged repeated criticism “that the current interpretation of D.C.Code, sec. 16–1005 by the local courts has been extremely narrow....” Id. at 10. It explained that the six remedial provisions added to the statute were “designed to meet the stated need in the public record for the court to be guided more specifically as to what remedies can be afforded to the public,” id., implying that those remedies were already authorized by the original statute. On the other hand, the report said that § 16–1005(c)(4) was one of “six new statutory remedies” being “created for issuance as the court deems just and appropriate,” id., implying that they were new remedies.

As a result, the legislative history of the 1982 amendments sends mixed signals about their purpose and effect. But nothing in the legislative history or the amending language clearly states that the newly added subsection (c)(4) is the only source of the court's authority to order a CPO respondent to vacate his residence. This court has previously and consistently recognized that “the plain intent of the legislature [in amending the Intrafamily Offenses Act] was an expansive reading of the Act, which we think must be accorded to the catchall provision as well.” Powell v. Powell, 547 A.2d 973, 974 (D.C.1988). Moreover, the committee report described the catch-all provision as “a very broad one,” and the provision itself remained unchanged. Report on Bill 4–195 at 10 n.*.

We conclude that the Council intended § 16–1005(c)(4) to focus on the frequently occurring circumstances where the petitioner and respondent were living together. In this paradigmatic situation, the court often would have to decide whether the petitioner or the respondent should be required to leave the common dwelling. By regulating this situation so closely, however, the Council did not intend subsection (c)(4) to become the exclusive source of the court's authority to order a respondent to vacate a dwelling. Instead, situations that § 1005(c)(4) did not specifically address—namely those where an order to vacate might be appropriate but the petitioner and respondent did not live together—remained within the purview of the stay-away and catch-all provisions of the statute.

The statute is no longer confined to intrafamily violence, but currently permits “any person who alleges ... that he or she is the victim of interpersonal, intimate partner, or intrafamily violence, stalking, sexual assault, or sexual abuse” to request a protection order. D.C.Code § 16–1001(12) (2012 Repl.). It thus reaches persons like Ms. Ramirez who have never lived with their assailant. Emphasizing that the Council has not expanded § 16–1005(c)(4) when enlarging the class of petitioners covered by the statute, appellant argues that the remedy of ordering the respondent to vacate his residence is simply not available in these circumstances.

It certainly is true that an order to vacate will most often be necessary when...