In Re MLB

California Court of Appeal Sep 23, 1980 No. 48761Published

Before: Koford

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Holding. The court held that Penal Code section 69 proscribes attempts to deter an executive officer from performing their duties through threats alone, even in the absence of physical force or violence.

Issues

Does Penal Code section 69 require the use of physical force or violence to constitute a violation?
Does the making of threats alone against a police officer constitute a violation of Penal Code section 69?

Disposition. affirmed

Quotations verified verbatim against the opinion

“the plain meaning of the statute proscribes attempts by threat to deter an executive officer from performing any duty.”

“The essential element of Penal Code section 69 is a "threat" or "force" or "violence."”

“section 69 proscribes interference with a police officer's performance of his duties by "threat" or by "violence" and that the section is violated by a "threat" without violence”

110 Cal.App.3d 501 (1980) 168 Cal. Rptr. 57 In re M.L.B., a Person Coming Under the Juvenile Court Law.

THE PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Respondent,

M.L.B., Defendant and Appellant.

Docket No. 48761. Court of Appeals of California, First District, Division Four.

September 23, 1980. [502] COUNSEL

Carl J. Debevec, under appointment by the Court of Appeal, for Defendant and Appellant.

George Deukmejian, Attorney General, Robert H. Philibosian, Chief Assistant Attorney General, Edward P. O'Brien, Assistant Attorney General, and Thomas A. Brady, Deputy Attorney General, for Plaintiff and Respondent.

OPINION

KOFORD, J.[*]

After a contested hearing appellant, age 14, was found to be a person subject to the jurisdiction of the juvenile court and thereafter made a ward of that court, by reason of having committed a misdemeanor violation of section 69 of the Penal Code.

(1a) Appellant presented no evidence at the hearing and does not dispute the fact that he made threatening statements to police officers, but asserts on this appeal that the making of mere threats to an officer unaccompanied by force does not constitute a violation of the statute.

Appellant is wrong; the plain meaning of the statute proscribes attempts by threat to deter an executive officer from performing any duty.

[503] (2) The construction of a statute and its applicability to a given situation are questions of law alone. (Estate of Madison (1945) 26 Cal.2d 453, 456-457 [159 P.2d 630]; Killian v. City and County of San Francisco (1978) 77 Cal. App.3d 1, 7 [143 Cal. Rptr. 430]; 6 Witkin, Cal. Procedure (2d ed. 1971) Appeal, § 210, par. (1), p. 4201.) That threats alone may constitute a violation of section 69 is compelled by "`"the usual, ordinary import of the language"'" of the section. (See Killian v. City and County of San Francisco, supra, at pp. 7-8.)

In Re MLB

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