State v. Williams
| Decision Date | 27 May 1993 |
| Docket Number | No. CR-92-0074-PR,CR-92-0074-PR |
| Citation | 175 Ariz. 98,854 P.2d 131 |
| Parties | STATE of Arizona, Appellee, v. Roger WILLIAMS, Appellant. |
| Court | Arizona Supreme Court |
Arizona enhances sentences and imposes unique penalties for certain crimes, such as sexual assault and molestation, when committed against a minor under fifteen years old. A.R.S. § 13-604.01. These are called "dangerous crimes against children." We are asked to decide whether the use of a motor vehicle which injures a person who fortuitously happens to be under fifteen years old is one of these crimes. We hold that it is not.
On December 26, 1986, Roger Williams, while drunk, rammed his pickup truck into the back of a station wagon. A fourteen year old boy was thrown from the vehicle and badly injured. Williams was convicted of three felony counts, including aggravated assault for recklessly causing physical injury using a dangerous instrument under A.R.S. § 13-1204(A)(2). The jury found that the victim was a child under the age of fifteen, § 13-1204(B), and that the aggravated assault was a dangerous nature offense under A.R.S. § 13-604(G).
At sentencing, and over objection, the trial court determined that, because the victim of the aggravated assault was under the age of fifteen, the enhanced penalties for a "dangerous crime against children" were applicable. A.R.S. § 13-604.01. Applying that statute, the court sentenced Williams to the maximum term of twenty-two years for the aggravated assault. 1 But for this enhancement, an aggravated assault on a victim under fifteen is a class 2 felony under § 13-1204(B), the maximum sentence for which is 14 years, or if a "dangerous" offense under § 13-604, as here, 21 years. The court of appeals affirmed. State v. Williams, 168 Ariz. 367, 372, 813 P.2d 1376, 1381 (App.1991). We granted Williams' petition for review because of the statewide importance of the issue presented.
A.R.S. § 13-604.01 contains enhanced penalties for anyone convicted of a "dangerous crime against children." It provides for high presumptive sentences that can be decreased or increased within certain limits based on aggravating and mitigating circumstances. The statute further requires that the sentence for a "dangerous crime against children" be served consecutively to any other sentence, § 13-604.01(J), and without the possibility of parole, § 13-604.01(E). In addition, § 13-604.01(I) provides for lifetime parole after release for perpetrators of a completed "dangerous crime against children" and for discretionary lifetime probation for preparatory offenses. 2
Other consequences follow as well from a conviction for a "dangerous crime against children." A.R.S. § 13-3716 requires anyone convicted of a "dangerous crime against children" to give notice of the conviction when applying for employment or volunteering services with organizations that supervise children. The certificate of a teacher convicted of a "dangerous crime against children" must be immediately and permanently revoked under A.R.S. § 15-550. In addition, if there is clear and convincing evidence that a person in custody committed a "dangerous crime against children," he or she cannot be admitted to bail. A.R.S. § 13-3961(E). A process exists for expediting the prosecution of "dangerous crimes against children" over all other prosecutions. A.R.S. § 13-123.
The question before this court is whether these penalties apply to persons like Williams, whose reckless actions created a risk to everyone around him and were not aimed at the young boy who ultimately became his victim. To answer that question, we must determine whether his actions constituted a "dangerous crime against children" as defined in § 13-604.01(K)(1), which states in relevant part:
1. "Dangerous crime against children" means any of the following committed against a minor under fifteen years of age:
(a) Second degree murder.
(b) Aggravated assault resulting in serious physical injury or committed by the use of a deadly weapon or dangerous instrument.
(c) Sexual assault.
(d) Molestation of a child.
(e) Sexual conduct with a minor.
(f) Commercial sexual exploitation of a minor.
(g) Sexual exploitation of a minor.
(h) Child abuse as defined in § 13-3623, subsection B, paragraph 1.
(i) Kidnapping.
(j) Sexual abuse.
(k) Taking a child for the purpose of prostitution as defined in § 13-3206.
(l ) Child prostitution as defined in § 13-3212.
(m) Involving or using minors in drug offenses.
(Emphasis added.)
The state argues that an enumerated offense constitutes a "dangerous crime against children" whenever the victim is under the age of fifteen. Williams argues that an enumerated offense constitutes a "dangerous crime against children" only when it is committed intentionally or knowingly, in spite of the fact that two of the offenses--aggravated assault and second degree murder--can be committed by reckless conduct. We reject each of these arguments.
Our task in interpreting the meaning of a statute is to fulfill the intent of the legislature that wrote it. State v. Korzep, 165 Ariz. 490, 493, 799 P.2d 831, 834 (1990); Martin v. Martin, 156 Ariz. 452, 457, 752 P.2d 1038, 1043 (1988). We look first to the statute's language because we expect it to be "the best and most reliable index of a statute's meaning." Janson v. Christenson, 167 Ariz. 470, 471, 808 P.2d 1222, 1223 (1991). If the language is plain, we need look no further. Id. A.R.S. § 13-104 requires us to construe language "according to ... fair meaning ... to promote justice and effect the objects of the law, including the purposes stated in § 13-101," which seeks to exclude conduct "as criminal when it does not fall within the purposes set forth." § 13-101(3).
We first look at our aggravated assault statute. A.R.S. § 13-1204 already enhances the sentence for assaults committed on persons under fifteen years old. For example, under § 13-1204(A)(4), an assault on a person under fifteen is an aggravated assault. And, under § 13-1204(B), aggravated assaults involving serious physical injury or the use of a deadly weapon or dangerous instrument are class 3 felonies, "except if the victim is under fifteen years of age in which case it is a class 2 felony punishable pursuant to § 13-604.01." Thus, whether § 13-604.01 is applicable or not, there is sentence enhancement from a class 3 felony to a class 2 felony when the victim is under fifteen. The question then is whether § 13-604.01 enhances the crime a second time whenever the victim is under fifteen, or does § 13-604.01 have within it an additional requirement? We now turn to § 13-604.01.
An examination of § 13-604.01 indicates that most "dangerous crimes against children" are those one would ordinarily associate with the term. They include sexual assault, molestation, sexual conduct, commercial sexual exploitation, sexual exploitation, child abuse, kidnapping, sexual abuse, child prostitution, and using minors in drug offenses. "Dangerous crime against children" is defined as committing one of the listed offenses "against a minor under fifteen years of age." Given the list of crimes, and the language "against a minor," a fair construction of the statute is that it refers to crimes in which a child is the target of the criminal conduct. That is to say, a dangerous crime against a child is a crime against a child qua child. The word "against" means "directly opposite," "facing," "in opposition," or "hostility to." Webster's Seventh New Collegiate Dictionary 17 (1967). This supports the meaning that a crime against a child is a crime against a child as a child or in the capacity of a child.
Of course, aggravated assault can be like many of the crimes on the list of "dangerous crimes against children." A person could, for example, cause serious physical injury by striking a child, or a person might confront a child with a deadly weapon. In each of these instances, there could be no serious doubt that the crime of aggravated assault would be a dangerous crime against a child. But what of this case? In contrast to most of the crimes on the list, aggravated assault can be committed without targeting anyone. A child could be the unintended and unknown victim of someone's generalized unfocused conduct. The victim could just as well be an adult.
The state argues that it does not matter that the victim is only fortuitously under fifteen. It argues that the language "committed against a minor under fifteen years of age" is coextensive with the language "the victim is under fifteen years of age." But the legislature used the language "under fifteen years of age" in § 13-1204(B) to enhance the sentence for aggravated assault from a class 3 to a class 2 felony. That happens automatically where the victim is "under fifteen years of age," whether fortuitous or not. The legislature did not use the same language in § 13-604.01. It did not define a dangerous crime against children as one of the listed crimes where the "victim is under fifteen years of age." Instead, it chose the more limiting language "committed against a minor under fifteen years of age," and listed crimes, most of which, by definition, target children.
Williams argues that a "dangerous crime against children" can only be committed intentionally or knowingly, in contrast to recklessly. We reject this argument for two separate and independent reasons. First, aggravated assault and second degree murder are on the list of crimes and each can be committed by reckless conduct. A child could be the target of a reckless crime. For example, a driver, like Williams, who harasses a well marked school...
To continue reading
Request your trial
-
City of Tucson v. Clear Channel Outdoor
...index of a statute's meaning.'" N. Valley Emergency Specialists, 208 Ariz. 301, ¶ 9, 93 P.3d at 503, quoting State v. Williams, 175 Ariz. 98, 100, 854 P.2d 131, 133 (1993). When the language of a statute is clear and unambiguous, a court should not look beyond the language, but rather "simp......
-
State v. Berger
...to punish and deter" "those predators who pose a direct and continuing threat to the children of Arizona." State v. Williams, 175 Ariz. 98, 102, 854 P.2d 131, 135 (1993) (reviewing the legislative history of § ¶ 23 Given this history, we conclude that the legislature had a "reasonable basis......
-
State v. Tucker
...language because we expect it to be the best and most reliable index of a statute's meaning.’ ” Id., quoting State v. Williams, 175 Ariz. 98, 100, 854 P.2d 131, 133 (1993). “ ‘When the plain text of a statute is clear and unambiguous there is no need to resort to other methods of statutory ......
-
State v. Smith
...with no intent to harm her (a crime committed fortuitously, but not knowingly against a child). See State v. (Roger ) Williams , 175 Ariz. 98, 101, 102–04, 854 P.2d 131, 134, 135-37 (1993) (holding that the evidence did not show the defendant committed a crime against a child where the defe......