State v. Miller
| Decision Date | 19 March 2016 |
| Docket Number | 595,113 |
| Court | Kansas Court of Appeals |
| Parties | State of Kansas, Appellant, v. Daleen Renee Miller, Appellee. |
NOT DESIGNATED FOR PUBLICATION
Appeal from Shawnee District Court; Nancy E. Parrish, judge.
Brett Watson, assistant district attorney, Chadwick J. Taylor district attorney, and Derek Schmidt, attorney general, for appellant.
Ann Sagan, of Third Judicial District Public Defender Office, for appellee.
Before Pierron, P.J., Bruns and Gardner, JJ.
The State appeals from an order dismissing its complaint against Daleen Renee Miller for interference with law enforcement by falsely reporting information to law enforcement officers during an investigation. On appeal, we conclude that there was sufficient evidence presented at the preliminary hearing to bind Miller over for trial on the charge of violating K.S.A. 2014 Supp. 21-5904(a)(1)(C). Moreover, applying the plain and unambiguous language of the statute, we do not find that the State is required to establish a "substantial hindrance" in order to prove a violation of K.S.A. 2014 Supp. 21-5904(a)(1)(C). Finally, we do not find the statute to be unconstitutionally vague or overbroad. Thus, we reverse and remand this case to the district court for further proceedings.
Around 10 a.m. on November 28, 2014, Officers Matthew Langworthy and Michael Diehl of the Topeka Police Department performed a "hotel interdiction" at a motel in west Topeka. A motel interdiction is a procedure in which law enforcement officers enter the names from a motel's guest list into a database to check for any outstanding warrants. When Officer Langworthy entered the name "Daleen Miller" into the database, he discovered an outstanding felony warrant in the State of Oklahoma and saw that Oklahoma was willing to extradite. Moreover, the database described Miller as a Native American male who was 5 feet, 6 inches tall and weighed 220 pounds.
Officer Langworthy then called his supervisor, Corporal Joshua Klamm so that he could accompany the officers to Miller's room. When Corporal Klamm arrived, all three officers went to Miller's room on the third floor of the motel. Officer Langworthy later estimated that it took them 45 seconds to reach Miller's room from the lobby. The officers arrived at Miller's door about 1 hour before checkout, which was 11 a.m.
When Officer Langworthy knocked on the door, a Native American woman with wet hair-later identified as Miller-opened the door. After Officer Langworthy identified himself, he told the woman that the officers were looking for a male named "Daleen Miller" who had rented the room. Miller told them that her name was Renee Grant and that she could not speak with them because she was getting ready for work. When the officers asked where Daleen Miller was, she told them that Miller was shopping at Wal-Mart. The officers also asked for a description of Miller, and she responded that Miller was a female who looked like her. The woman then closed the door and locked it.
Officer Langworthy again knocked on the door, and Miller once again stated that Miller was not there before closing the door. The officer then knocked a third time and asked Miller to come out of the motel room to speak with Corporal Klamm. In addition, the officers obtained permission to search the motel room. However, the officers did not find anybody else in the room.
Shortly thereafter, the officers returned to the motel office, where they obtained a photocopy of Daleen Miller's tribal identification card, which had Miller's picture. The officers then returned to the room and knocked on the door. Officer Langworthy told Miller that he knew she was lying and asked her to tell him her real name. After she repeatedly maintained that her name was Renee Grant, the officer arrested her.
Approximately 20 minutes elapsed from the time that Officer Langworthy initially spoke with Miller to the time that he placed her in custody. Even after she was placed under arrest, Miller claimed that her name was Renee Grant. Officer Langworthy then transported her to the Shawnee County Jail. It was not until after she was searched by correction officers that she finally admitted that her name was indeed Daleen Miller.
On December 2, 2014, the State charged Miller with one count of interference with law enforcement, false report. Although the complaint cited K.S.A. 2014 Supp. 21-5904(a)(1)(B) for authority, the language mirrored that of K.S.A. 2014 Supp 21-5904(a)(1)(C). The district court held a preliminary hearing on January 14, 2015.
During the preliminary hearing, Officer Langworthy testified for the State. At the conclusion of his testimony, Miller's attorney argued that the State had presented no evidence to find that she had violated K.S.A. 2014 Supp. 21-5904 (a)(1)(B). In response, the State acknowledged that the charging document erroneously cited subsection (a)(1)(B). Instead, the State requested that the complaint be amended to reflect that Miller violated K.S.A. 2014 Supp 21-5904(a)(1)(C). Nevertheless, Miller's counsel argued that even if the case were to proceed under K.S.A. 2014 Supp. 21-5904(a)(1)(C), the State could not establish probable cause because it could not prove that Miller's actions substantially hindered Officer Langworthy in the performance of his official duties.
The State argued that K.S.A. 2014 Supp. 21-5904(a)(1)(C) does not legally require a showing of substantial hindrance. Although the district court ultimately bound Miller over for trial, it stated that it would need to conduct further research to determine whether substantial hindrance was an element of K.S.A. 2014 Supp. 21-5904(a)(1)(C). Moreover, at the conclusion of hearing, the district court entered a plea of not guilty on Miller's behalf.
On February 12, 2015, Miller filed a motion to dismiss the complaint, raising the same arguments she made during the preliminary hearing. She also briefly argued without citation that if the court were to find that substantial hindrance was not a requirement, the statute would be unconstitutionally overbroad. The State filed a response, in which it admitted that it had cited the wrong subsection of K.S.A. 2014 Supp. 21-5904(a) even though it quoted the language from the proper subsection. It also argued-as it did during the preliminary hearing-that K.S.A. 2014 Supp. 21-5904(a)(1)(C) did not require a finding of substantial hindrance.
The district court held a hearing on Miller's motion to dismiss on March 20, 2015, during which the parties presented their arguments. Also during the hearing, the State sought leave to amend its complaint to properly cite subsection K.S.A. 2014 Supp. 21-5904(a)(1)(C), which the district court granted. The district court ultimately ruled from the bench that even though K.S.A. 2014 Supp. 21-5904(a)(1)(C) does not explicitly require a finding of substantial hindrance, cases with similar factual backgrounds indicate that such a finding is required. It also found that the State did not provide enough evidence to show that Miller substantially hindered Officer Langworthy, so it dismissed the complaint.
On March 23, 2015, the State filed an amended complaint in which it cited K.S.A. 2014 Supp. 21-5904(a)(1)(C) for authority. On April 3, 2015, the State filed a notice of appeal, which became timely when the district court filed a journal entry granting Miller's motion to dismiss on April 9, 2015.
To bind a defendant over at a preliminary hearing, the district court must find that the evidence is sufficient to cause a reasonable person of ordinary prudence and caution to conscientiously entertain a reasonable belief of the defendant's guilt. On appeal from the granting or denial of a motion to dismiss filed after the preliminary hearing our review of the district court's probable cause finding is unlimited. State v. Washington, 293 Kan. 732, 734, 268 P.3d 475 (2012).
In reviewing the evidence, we are to draw inferences in favor of the State. Since the evidence need only show probable cause rather than guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, even weak evidence should be sufficient to bind over a defendant for trial as long as it tends to establish that the offense was committed and that the defendant committed it. 293 Kan. at 733-34. In addition, interpretation of a statute is a question of a law over which courts have unlimited review. State v. Eddy, 299 Kan. 29, 32, 321 P.3d 12 (2014).
K.S.A. 2014 Supp. 21-5904(a) provides that interference with law enforcement is:
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