Thornton v. State

• Decision Date: 16 November 2020
• Docket Number: S20G0613
• Citation: 310 Ga. 460,851 S.E.2d 564
• Parties: THORNTON v. The STATE.
• Court: Georgia Supreme Court

310 Ga. 460

851 S.E.2d 564

THORNTON

v.The STATE.

S20G0613

Supreme Court of Georgia.

Decided: November 16, 2020

Jad B. Johnson, David J. Dunn, Jr., Victor P. Aloisio, III, for Appellant.

Christopher A. Arnt, District Attorney,Megan S. Deitz, Assistant District Attorney, for Appellee.

Christopher M. Carr, Attorney General, Ross W. Bergethon, Deputy Solicitor-General, amici curiae.

Blackwell, Justice.

In the parking lot of a gas station, a Department of Natural Resources (DNR) game warden told Christopher Thornton to turn down the volume of his car stereo. Thornton refused to comply, and he eventually drove away, dragging the game warden for a short distance. He later was arrested and charged with several crimes, including two counts of obstructing a game warden in the lawful discharge of his official duties.¹ Thornton was tried for these crimes by a Walker County jury and convicted. He appealed, arguing that the evidence presented at trial was insufficient to sustain his convictions for obstruction because it failed to establish that the game warden was in the lawful discharge of his official duties at the time of the incident. In particular, Thornton argued that a game warden has no authority to enforce the Uniform Rules of the Road² —including OCGA § 40-6-14,³ which limits the volume of sound that can be emitted from a stereo in a motor vehicle—in the parking lot of a gas station. In Thornton v. State, 353 Ga. App. 252, 836 S.E.2d 541 (2019), the Court of Appeals rejected these arguments and affirmed the judgment of conviction. We granted a petition for a writ of certiorari to review that decision, and although our analysis differs somewhat from that of the Court of Appeals, we likewise conclude that the obstruction convictions can stand. Accordingly, we affirm the judgment of the Court of Appeals.

1. Viewed in the light most favorable to the verdict, the evidence presented at trial shows that Thornton was parked at a gas pump outside a gas station in the City of LaFayette on January 10, 2013. A DNR game warden—on duty and in uniform—stopped at the gas station to refuel his DNR vehicle.⁴ The game warden noticed that the stereo in Thornton's car was blaring music very loudly. The game warden approached Thornton, identified himself as a DNR law enforcement officer, and asked Thornton to turn down the volume of the stereo. When Thornton refused, the game warden told him that the loud music was in violation of state law, and Thornton became increasingly belligerent. The game warden then went to retrieve his radio from his DNR vehicle, instructing Thornton to remain outside his car. In defiance of this instruction, Thornton got into his car. The game warden returned, and as he approached Thornton again, he noticed that the music was blaring even more loudly. The game warden told Thornton to exit the car, informing him that he was under arrest for obstruction. Thornton refused to exit the car, and the game warden reached through an open window of the car in an attempt to grab Thornton's identification card. As the game warden did so, Thornton drove away, dragging the game warden a short distance, while the game warden instructed Thornton to bring his car to a stop.

Thornton was later arrested, charged with two counts of obstruction—a misdemeanor count for defying the instructions of the game warden, and a felony count for offering violence to the game warden—and convicted of those crimes. He appealed, and the Court of Appeals affirmed, rejecting Thornton's argument that the evidence failed to show that the game warden was in the lawful discharge of his official duties at the time of the incident. The Court of Appeals held that the game warden was authorized under OCGA § 40-13-30 to enforce the Rules of the Road, see Thornton, 353 Ga. App. at 254-255 (1), 836 S.E.2d 541, and it cited OCGA § 40-6-3 (a) (2) for the proposition that the Rules of the Road apply in parking lots, see 353 Ga. App. at 255 (1) n.6, 836 S.E.2d 541. We issued a writ of certiorari to review the decision of the Court of Appeals, directing the parties to address these two questions:

1. Does OCGA § 40-13-30 grant statewide arrest powers to Department of Natural Resources game wardens for violations of the Uniform Rules of the Road?

2. Do the provisions of OCGA § 40-6-1 et seq. apply generally to privately owned shopping centers, parking lots, or other similar areas that are not customarily used by the public as through streets or connector streets, see OCGA § 40-6-3 (a) (2) ?

As we explain below, the answer to the first question is yes, game wardens do have authority to enforce the Rules of the Road at any location in Georgia where OCGA § 40-13-30 applies. And although the answer to the second question is no, the State presented evidence in this case that the parking lot of the gas station in question was used customarily as a through or connector street, and the evidence is not, therefore, insufficient to sustain the convictions. Accordingly, we affirm the judgment of the Court of Appeals.

2. We first consider the extent to which game wardens have authority under OCGA § 40-13-30 to enforce the Rules of the Road, and we conclude the game warden in this case had such authority. We begin, however, by recalling some of the familiar and settled principles that inform our consideration of the meaning of a statute. "A statute draws its meaning from its text," City of Marietta v. Summerour, 302 Ga. 645, 649 (2), 807 S.E.2d 324 (2017) (citation and punctuation omitted), and as we read the text, "we must presume that the General Assembly meant what it said and said what it meant." Deal v. Coleman, 294 Ga. 170, 172 (1) (a), 751 S.E.2d 337 (2013) (citation and punctuation omitted). To this end, "we must view the statutory text in the context in which it appears," id., (citation omitted), and "[f]or context, we may look to other provisions of the same statute, the structure and history of the whole statute, and the other law—constitutional, statutory, and common law alike—that forms the legal background of the statutory provision in question." Zaldivar v. Prickett, 297 Ga. 589, 591 (1), 774 S.E.2d 688 (2015) (citation and punctuation omitted). In the light of the relevant context, "we must read the statutory text in its most natural and reasonable way, as an ordinary speaker of the English language would." Deal, 294 Ga. at 172-173 (1) (a), 751 S.E.2d 337 And when we are confronted with a statute having several parts, we must endeavor to harmonize thoseparts so as to "give a sensible and intelligent effect to each part." Premier Health Care Investments v. UHS of Anchor, ––– Ga. ––––, –––– (3) (c) 849 S.E.2d 441 (2020) (citation and punctuation omitted).. With these principles in mind, we turn now to the text and context of OCGA § 40-13-30.

Article 2 of Chapter 13 of Title 40, of which OCGA § 40-13-30 is a part, concerns the prosecution of misdemeanor traffic offenses in probate and municipal courts. Pertinent to this case, which arose from an incident at a gas station within the municipal limits of LaFayette, OCGA § 40-13-29 provides that "the judge of the municipal court in each municipal corporation shall have exclusive jurisdiction of traffic misdemeanor cases originating inside the corporate limits of municipalities." And OCGA § 40-13-24 provides that a prosecution of a misdemeanor traffic offense in a municipal court does not require an indictment or accusation, and such a prosecution instead may be commenced by a citation and complaint. To that end, OCGA § 40-13-30 provides:

Officers of the Georgia State Patrol and any other officer of this state or of any county or municipality thereof having authority to arrest for a criminal offense of the grade of misdemeanor shall have authority to prefer charges and bring offenders to trial under this article, provided that officers of an incorporated municipality shall have no power to make arrests beyond the corporate limits of such municipality unless such jurisdiction is given by local or other law.

Examining the statutory text, we discern three distinct parts of the statute.

The first part identifies the officers to whom the statute applies, namely, officers of the State Patrol, as well as other state officers, county officers, and municipal officers "having authority to arrest for a criminal offense of the grade of misdemeanor[.]" The second part confers upon these officers the "authority to prefer charges and bring offenders to trial under [Article 2 of Chapter 13 of Title 40]," a grant of authority that necessarily implies the power to enforce the Rules of the Road by the issuance of a citation for a misdemeanor violation of the rules, see OCGA § 40-13-24,⁵ as well as the concomitant power to effectuate an arrest by citation.⁶ And the third part of OCGA § 40-13-30 appears to be a limitation of the second with respect to municipal officers, providing that they "shall have no power to make arrests beyond the corporate limits of [their respective] municipalit[ies] unless such jurisdiction is given by local or other law."

We readily conclude that a DNR game warden is among the officers identified in the first part of OCGA § 40-13-30. Thornton does not dispute that a game warden is an "officer of this state ... having authority to arrest for a criminal offense of the grade of misdemeanor[.]" and he is right not to dispute it. DNR is a department of the state government, and inasmuch as they are classified as "a unit of peace officers" within DNR, see OCGA § 27-1-16 (a), game wardens undoubtedly are "officer[s] of this state" for purposes of OCGA § 40-13-30. Moreover, game wardens are specifically and expressly authorized to make arrests for violations "of the laws, rules, and regulations pertaining to wildlife or to hunting, fishing, or boating[,]" OCGA § 27-1-20 (a) (4), violations that most commonly are misdemeanors. See OCGA § 27-1-38 (generally classifying violations of Game and Fish Code as misdemeanor offenses)....