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Michigan Supreme Court 

Lansing, Michigan 48909 

C hief Justice Justices 

Maura D. Corrigan	 Michael F. Cavanagh 

Elizabeth A. Weaver 

Marilyn Kelly 

Clifford W. Taylor Opinion Robert P. Young, Jr. 

Stephen J. Markman 

FILED JANUARY 30, 2001
 

PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF MICHIGAN,
 

Plaintiff-Appellee,
 

v	 No. 114227
 

BRIAN JAMES STONE,
 

Defendant-Appellant.
 

BEFORE THE ENTIRE BENCH 


CAVANAGH, J.
 

This criminal prosecution under the Michigan
 

eavesdropping statutes requires us to decide whether a
 

conversation held on a cordless telephone is a “private
 

conversation” as that term is used in the statutes. We
 

conclude that, although current technology may allow cordless
 

telephone conversations to be intercepted, such conversations
 

nonetheless can be private conversations under the
 

eavesdropping statutes. Accordingly, we affirm the judgment
 
of the Court of Appeals.
 

I
 

The facts underlying this case occurred while the divorce
 

of defendant Brian Stone from Joanne Stone was pending.
 

During their marriage, the Stones lived next door to Ronald
 

Pavlik. In 1995, defendant became estranged from his wife and
 

moved out of the couple’s home, though Joanne continued to
 

live there. After defendant moved from the couple’s home,
 

Pavlik told defendant that he owned a police scanner, and that
 

he could listen to, and had been recording, calls Joanne made
 

on her cordless telephone. Defendant asked for the tapes, and
 

told Pavlik to “keep on top of things, tape and find out what
 

was going on.”
 

Joanne suspected that her calls were being monitored
 

because certain people had information about her that they
 

should not have had. In one instance, a friend of the court
 

investigator told Joanne that defendant had told the
 

investigator that he had a tape recording proving that Joanne
 

was pregnant and planning to leave the state. According to
 

Joanne, she had only mentioned these matters in a telephone
 

conversation with a friend. Because of her suspicions, in
 

1996, Joanne contacted the State Police.
 

After interviewing several people, the police obtained
 

search warrants for both defendant’s and Pavlik’s residences.
 

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Between the two homes, they found approximately fifteen tapes
 

containing recordings of Joanne’s telephone conversations with
 

her family, her friends, and her attorney.
 

Defendant was charged under the eavesdropping statutes
 

and was bound over for trial. He brought a motion to quash
 

the information, which the circuit court granted because it
 

believed that a person conversing on a cordless telephone
 

could not reasonably expect her conversation to be a “private
 

conversation.” The people appealed, and the Court of Appeals
 

reversed, reasoning that the circuit court erred by relying on
 

the concept of a reasonable expectation of privacy. 234 Mich
 

App 117; 593 NW2d 680 (1999). Initially, this Court held this
 

case in abeyance, pending our resolution of Dickerson v
 

Raphael, 461 Mich 851 (1999). Thereafter, we granted leave to
 

appeal. 461 Mich 996 (2000).
 

II
 

Because this case arrives here on defendant’s motion to
 

quash the information, we must review the magistrate’s
 

decision to bind defendant over for trial. A magistrate has
 

a duty to bind over a defendant for trial if it appears that
 

a felony has been committed and there is probable cause to
 

believe that the defendant committed that felony. MCL 766.13;
 

MSA 28.931. Absent an abuse of discretion, reviewing courts
 

should not disturb a magistrate’s determination. People v
 

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Doss, 406 Mich 90, 101; 276 NW2d 9 (1979). In the instant
 

case, defendant argues that the magistrate’s decision to bind
 

him over was an abuse of discretion because his alleged
 

conduct does not fit within the scope of the eavesdropping
 

statutes. Determining the scope of a criminal statute is a
 

matter of statutory interpretation, subject to de novo review.
 

People v Denio, 454 Mich 691, 698; 564 NW2d 13 (1997).
 

A. THE EAVESDROPPING STATUTES
 

Defendant was charged under MCL 750.539c; MSA 28.807(3),
 

which provides:
 

Any person who is present or who is not


present during a private conversation and who


wilfully uses any device to eavesdrop upon the


conversation without the consent of all parties


thereto, or who knowingly aids, employs, or
 

procures another person to do the same in violation


of this section, is guilty of a felony punishable


by imprisonment in a state prison for not more than


2 years or by a fine of not more than $2,000.00, or


both.
 

The statutes define “eavesdrop” as “to overhear, record,
 

amplify or transmit any part of the private discourse of
 

others without the permission of all persons engaged in the
 

discourse.” MCL 750.539a(2); MSA 28.807(1)(2). In the
 

present case, the facts as alleged indicate that Joanne
 

Stone’s cordless telephone conversations were wilfully
 

recorded by Ronald Pavlik, without her consent, at defendant’s
 

prompting. Because this case involves such alleged wilful
 

“record[ing],” the statutory prohibition against wilful
 

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“overhear[ing]” is not before us. Instead, the question
 

before us is whether defendant is correct that the
 

conversations eavesdropped on could not be “private
 

conversations” because they were held on a cordless telephone.
 

B. THE MEANING OF “PRIVATE CONVERSATION”
 

To answer this question, we must first define “private
 

conversation.” Determining this phrase’s meaning requires us
 

to construe the eavesdropping statutes, and the primary goal
 

of statutory construction is to give effect to the
 

Legislature’s intent. People v Morey, 461 Mich 325, 330; 603
 

NW2d 250 (1999). To ascertain that intent, this Court begins
 

with the statute’s language. When that language is
 

unambiguous, no further judicial construction is required or
 

permitted, because the Legislature is presumed to have
 

intended the meaning it plainly expressed. Id.
 

Here, the plain language of the eavesdropping statutes
 

does not define “private conversation.” This Court may
 

consult dictionaries to discern the meaning of statutorily
 

undefined terms. Id. However, recourse to dictionary
 

definitions is unnecessary when the Legislature’s intent can
 

be determined from reading the statute itself. Renown Stove
 

Co v Unemployment Compensation Comm, 328 Mich 436, 440; 44
 

NW2d 1 (1950).
 

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Despite the Legislature failing to define “private
 

conversation” in the eavesdropping statutes, its intent can be
 

determined from the eavesdropping statutes themselves. This
 

is because the Legislature did define the term “private
 

place.” A “private place” is “a place where one may
 

reasonably expect to be safe from casual or hostile intrusion
 

or surveillance.” MCL 750.539a(1); MSA 28.807(1)(1). By
 

reading the statutes, the Legislature’s intent that private
 

places are places where a person can reasonably expect privacy
 

becomes clear. Applying the same concepts the Legislature
 

used to define those places that are private, we can define
 

those conversations that are private. Thus, “private
 

conversation” means a conversation that a person reasonably
 

expects to be free from casual or hostile intrusion or
 

surveillance. Additionally, this conclusion is supported by
 

this Court’s decision in Dickerson v Raphael, in which we
 

stated that whether a conversation is private depends on
 

whether the person conversing “intended and reasonably
 

expected that the conversation was private.” Dickerson, supra
 

at 851.
 

Although this definition of “private conversation”
 

facially resembles standards that the United States Supreme
 

Court has used in Fourth Amendment cases, those standards
 

developed in the context of law enforcement activity seeking
 

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to detect criminal behavior. See Katz v United States, 389
 

US 347, 360; 88 S Ct 507; 19 L Ed 2d 576 (1967) (Harlan, J.).
 

However, our definition of “private conversation” emanates
 

from our eavesdropping statutes, which, by their own terms, do
 

not apply to law enforcement personnel acting within their
 

lawful authority. MCL 750.539g(a); MSA 28.807(7)(a). Because
 

of these differences, we do not rely on the Fourth Amendment
 

jurisprudence, and do not incorporate it into our statute.
 

Rather, we rely only on the eavesdropping statutes’ language
 

to define the term “private conversation.”
 

C. PRIVATE CONVERSATIONS ON CORDLESS TELEPHONES
 

Defendant invites this Court to hold that, as a matter of
 

law, a conversation held on a cordless telephone cannot be a
 

private conversation. He relies on language in the Court of
 

Appeals decision in Dickerson v Raphael, 222 Mich App 185,
 

194; 564 NW2d 85 (1997), rev’d 461 Mich 851 (1999), to argue
 

that a cordless telephone works by sending a radio-like signal
 

from the telephone’s handset to its base, and that users of
 

cordless telephones know that these signals can be intercepted
 

by devices including other cordless telephones and police
 

scanners. This knowledge, he concludes, “renders unreasonable
 

an expectation of privacy” in a cordless telephone
 

conversation. Id.
 

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We decline defendant’s invitation because such an
 

interpretation would negate an express protection in the
 

eavesdropping statutes. Specifically, MCL 750.539c; MSA
 

28.807(3) protects private conversations against eavesdropping
 

accomplished through the wilful use of “any device.” This
 

protection indicates that the Legislature considered that a
 

conversation can be private, yet can also be susceptible to
 

eavesdropping through any device. Otherwise, it would have
 

had no need to protect private conversations against such an
 

intrusion. Indeed, were defendant correct that a conversation
 

that a person knows is susceptible to eavesdropping through
 

any device is not private, then the statutory protection
 

against eavesdropping accomplished through any device would be
 

null. This is because a conversation susceptible to
 

eavesdropping with any device would, because of that
 

characteristic, fall outside the protected class of private
 

conversations, leaving no “private conversation” to be
 

protected from eavesdropping with any device. Whenever
 

possible, courts must give effect to every word, phrase, and
 

clause in a statute. Morey, supra at 330. Therefore, to give
 

effect to the statutory protection against eavesdropping
 

accomplished through “any device,” we must reject defendant’s
 

position. 


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Further, although a person who talks on a cordless
 

telephone may know that technology makes it possible for
 

others to overhear the conversation, that person also can
 

presume that others will obey the criminal law. See Papadimas
 

v Mykonos Lounge, 176 Mich App 40, 47; 439 NW2d 280 (1989);
 

Prosser & Keeton, Torts (5th ed) § 33, p 201. Thus, although
 

the victim may have known that her cordless telephone
 

conversations could be wilfully intercepted with a device, she
 

also could presume that others would not eavesdrop on her
 

cordless telephone conversations using any device because
 

doing so is a felony under the eavesdropping statutes, and is
 

additionally prohibited by federal law. See 47 USC 1001 et
 

seq. As a matter of law, it was not unreasonable for her to
 

expect that her cordless telephone conversations were private.
 

We recognize that our holding differs with many decisions
 

concluding that cordless telephone users cannot expect privacy
 

in their telephone conversations. See, e.g., People v Wilson,
 

196 Ill App 3d 997, 1009-1010; 554 NE2d 545 (1990); Salmon v
 

State, 206 Ga App 469, 470; 426 SE2d 160 (1993), superseded by
 

statute, Ga Code Ann § 16-11-66.1; McKamey v Roach, 55 F3d
 

1236, 1239-1241 (CA 6, 1995). However, these cases were
 

decided under statutes with language different from that of
 

the Michigan eavesdropping statutes governing our decision in
 

this case. Notably, other state courts have held that
 

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cordless telephone users can expect privacy in their telephone
 

conversations when those states’ governing statutes have so
 

provided. See, e.g., State v Faford, 128 Wash 2d 476, 486;
 

910 P2d 447 (1996); State v Bidinost, 71 Ohio St 3d 449, 460;
 

644 NE2d 318 (1994). In addition, although certain federal
 

decisions, including McKamey, supra, held that there cannot be
 

an expectation of privacy in cordless telephone conversations,
 

federal law was subsequently amended to grant strict privacy
 

protections to cordless telephone conversations. See 47 USC
 

1001. Thus, although our decision differs with several
 

foreign authorities, it accords with current federal law, and
 

accords full meaning to the Michigan eavesdropping statutes.
 

Under those statutes, whether a person can reasonably
 

expect privacy in a conversation generally will present a
 

question of fact. See Dickerson, supra at 851. For example,
 

although a person is not precluded from having a reasonable
 

expectation of privacy in a conversation held on a cordless
 

telephone, a person who converses on a party line may not
 

reasonably expect the conversation to be private because
 

perhaps that person should know that others will be able to
 

listen to the conversation. Many such conversations may be
 

subject to “casual or hostile intrusion or surveillance,” MCL
 

750.539a(1); MSA 28.807(1)(1), but the final determination
 

will generally be for the factfinder.
 

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D. THE INSTANT CASE
 

In the instant case, we conclude that defendant was
 

properly bound over for trial. Defendant argues that Joanne
 

Stone could not have expected privacy in her cordless
 

telephone conversations because of her particularized
 

knowledge that Pavlik could intercept them. He bases his
 

argument on an averment in the warrant affidavit, which stated
 

that Pavlik had told Joanne that his scanner could intercept
 

cordless telephone conversations. However, Joanne’s testimony
 

at the preliminary examination was that Pavlik had told her
 

that he could listen to police signals, not cordless telephone
 

conversations. Although this evidence is conflicting,
 

Joanne’s testimony provided a sufficient basis for the
 

magistrate to find probable cause that defendant committed the
 

charged felony. The conflicts in the evidence must be
 

resolved by the trier of fact, not the magistrate. See People
 

v Hill, 433 Mich 464, 469; 446 NW2d 140 (1989). Because the
 

eavesdropping statutes do not preclude cordless telephone
 

conversations from being “private,” and because the evidence
 

at the preliminary examination was sufficient for the
 

magistrate to find probable cause of defendant’s guilt, the
 

magistrate did not abuse his discretion by binding defendant
 

over for trial.
 

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III
 

In conclusion, although technology provides a means for
 

eavesdropping, the Michigan eavesdropping statutes
 

specifically protect citizens against such intrusions.
 

Therefore, a person is not unreasonable to expect privacy in
 

a conversation although he knows that technology makes it
 

possible for others to eavesdrop on such conversations. The
 

judgment of the Court of Appeals is affirmed.
 

CORRIGAN, C.J., and WEAVER, KELLY, TAYLOR, YOUNG, and MARKMAN,
 

JJ., concurred with CAVANAGH, J.
 

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