Opinion ID: 3202889
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Attempted Threats

Text: Appellant’s primary argument is that the evidence was insufficient to convict him of attempted threats because the charge requires proof that he threatened “serious bodily harm” and “not just any kind of harm.” In making this argument, appellant urges that this court define “serious bodily harm,” a phrase which has appeared in some of our previous cases in the threats context,3 by 3 See Gray v. United States, 100 A.3d 129, 133 (D.C. 2014) (explaining that the offense of threats requires the words uttered “to convey fear of serious bodily harm or injury . . .”); Lewis v. United States, 95 A.3d 1289, 1291 (D.C. 2014) (same); Evans, supra note 2, 779 A.2d at 894 (same). 5 looking to the definition of “serious bodily injury” that applies in the context of aggravated assault.4 He claims that his statements did not meet this definition of “serious bodily harm” when he threatened to “smack the s out” of Ms. Brown and “get [her] fed up.” We review this question de novo. Sutton v. United States, 988 A.2d 478, 482 (D.C. 2010). Under D.C. Code § 22-407, it is a crime to utter or convey “threats to do bodily harm.” We have defined threats as requiring the following: “(1) that the defendant uttered words to another person; (2) that the words were of such a nature to cause the ordinary hearer reasonably to believe that the threatened harm would take place; and (3) that the defendant intended to utter the words as a threat.” In re S.W., 45 A.3d 151, 155 (D.C. 2012) (emphasis added) (citations, internal quotation marks, and brackets omitted); see also Joiner-Die, supra, 899 A.2d at 764 (same except for the third element, which the court described as “the defendant intended to utter the words which constituted the threat”). 4 In the aggravated assault context, serious bodily injury is defined as a “bodily injury that involves a substantial risk of death, unconsciousness, extreme physical pain, protracted and obvious disfigurement, or protracted loss or impairment of the function of a bodily member, organ or mental faculty.” Nixon v. United States, 730 A.2d 145, 149 (D.C. 1999) (quoting D.C. Code § 22-4101 (7), republished as D.C. Code § 22-3001 (7) (2012 Repl.)). 6 In contrast, appellant relies on language found in Griffin v. United States, 861 A.2d 610, 615 (D.C. 2004), and some of our other cases, see supra note 3, where we have characterized the crime of misdemeanor threats as requiring that the uttered words (or conduct) convey fear of “serious bodily harm.” For example, To satisfy its burden [of proving threats], the government must present credible evidence:

convey fear of serious bodily harm of injury to the ordinary hearer; and 3. That the defendant intended to utter these words as a threat. Griffin, supra, 861 A.2d at 615 (emphasis added) (citations and footnotes omitted). Additionally, the current Criminal Jury Instructions define threats as causing a person to reasonably believe that he or she would be “seriously harmed.” Criminal Jury Instructions for the District of Columbia, No. 4.130 (5th ed. rev. 2013). We are confident that usage of the phrase “serious bodily harm,” as opposed to just “bodily harm,” in some of our cases does not indicate a requirement of proof that a defendant threatened a particular degree or severity of injury. 7 As far as we can tell, no case from this court has ever squarely considered whether the crime of threats requires proof of a threat to do bodily harm (of any type) or a threat to do serious bodily harm. It is well-established that “[t]he rule of stare decisis is never properly invoked unless in the decision put forward as precedent the judicial mind has been applied to and passed upon the precise question.” District of Columbia v. Sierra Club, 670 A.2d 354, 360 (D.C. 1996) (quoting Murphy v. McCloud, 650 A.2d 202, 205 (D.C. 1994)) (emphasis added). Consequently, because there is no case law deciding the issue raised by appellant and “[a] point of law merely assumed in an opinion, not discussed, is not authoritative,” this division has the authority to decide the question now without running afoul of M.A.P. v. Ryan, 285 A.2d 310, 312 (D.C. 1971) (“[N]o division of this court will overrule a prior decision of this court . . . .”).5 Our threats statute does not mention the word “serious.” Because it is a well-established principle that the “definition of the elements of a criminal offense is entrusted to the legislature,” the absence of the word “serious” from our threats statute (since at least the 1967 codification, see Gurley v. United States, 308 A.2d 5 For example, in Jones v. United States, 124 A.3d 127, 131 (D.C. 2015), this court did not consider whether appellant’s similar threat to “smack the s[] out of [the complainant]” constituted a threat to do “serious” bodily harm, as opposed to just bodily harm, even though it used the “serious bodily harm” formulation of the crime. 8 785, 787 (D.C. 1973)) is a strong indicator that the legislature never intended to distinguish between threats to do “serious bodily harm” and threats to do “bodily harm.” See Hood v. United States, 28 A.3d 553, 559 (D.C. 2011) (“Generally speaking, if the plain meaning of statutory language is clear and unambiguous and will not produce an absurd result, we will look no further.” (footnote and internal quotation marks omitted)). A further review of the case law supports this view. The government observes, and appellant does not dispute, that the “serious bodily harm” language seems to have first appeared in a footnote in a 1982 case, Campbell v. United States, 450 A.2d 428, 431 n.5 (D.C. 1982). In characterizing the crime of threats as requiring that the “words were of such a nature as to convey fear of serious bodily harm or injury to the ordinary hearer,” Campbell cites two sources: an earlier case, Gurley, and an earlier version of the Criminal Jury Instructions for the crime of “threats to do bodily harm,” see Criminal Jury Instructions for the District of Columbia, No. 4.17 (3d ed. 1978). The court in Gurley, however, did not include any mention of “serious bodily harm” when defining the crime. See Gurley, supra, 308 A.2d at 787 (“All that the statute proscribes is a threat to do bodily harm.”). While the earlier version of the Criminal Jury Instructions admittedly did include the “serious bodily harm” language, the instructions include 9 comments that make clear that the language was adapted from Postell v. United States, 282 A.2d 551 (D.C. 1971), the first case interpreting our threats statute, which, like Gurley, did not mention “serious bodily harm” when defining the crime. Id. at 553 (“The gist of the crime is that the words used are of such a nature as to convey a menace or fear of bodily harm to the ordinary hearer.”). The “serious bodily harm” language appears to have been inadvertently added into some of our cases based on the following passage found in Postell: “[W]hether under the circumstances the language used by appellant when heard by the ordinary person would be understood as being spoken not in jest, but as carrying the serious promise of bodily harm or death.” Id. at 554 (emphasis added). However, what the court in Postell was speaking to when referencing the word “serious” was that the threat had to be seriously made (as opposed to a joke), not that the defendant needed to threaten serious bodily harm. Finally, while appellant claims that we should adopt the definition of “serious bodily injury,” an element of our aggravated assault crime, see supra note 4, for “serious bodily harm” in the threats context, there is a compelling difference between an assault and a threat that counsels against reading “serious bodily harm” into our threats statute by incorporating the “serious bodily injury” definition. Our assault statute criminalizes violent physical behavior against another. See Mungo 10 v. United States, 772 A.2d 240, 245 (D.C. 2001). Ordinarily, it is relatively straightforward to prove the degree or amount of violence that a defendant has inflicted onto another and punish him or her accordingly. 6 For example, to prove aggravated assault, the evidence must show that the victim suffered a “serious bodily injury,” defined as a “bodily injury that involves a substantial risk of death, unconsciousness, extreme physical pain, protracted and obvious disfigurement, or protracted loss or impairment of the function of a bodily member, organ or mental faculty.” Nixon, supra note 4, 730 A.2d at 149 (quoting D.C. Code § 22-4101 (7), republished as D.C. Code § 22-3001 (7)). Our threats statute, on the other hand, criminalizes speech that communicates to a listener “a serious expression of an intent to commit an act of unlawful violence[.]” Virginia v. Black, 538 U.S. 343, 359 (2003). Applying the definition of “serious bodily injury” from the aggravated assault context in the 6 Simple assault is a misdemeanor and ordinarily requires proof that the defendant used unlawful force to cause “injury to another” or “attempt[ed] to cause injury with the present ability to do so.” Mungo, supra, 772 A.2d at 245. Felony assault, the intermediate level, allows for up to three years in prison and requires proof that the assault caused “significant (but not grave) bodily injury.” Quintanilla v. United States, 62 A.3d 1261, 1263-64 (D.C. 2013) (citation, footnote, and internal quotation marks omitted). Lastly, aggravated assault allows for up to ten years in prison and requires proof that the assault caused “serious bodily injury.” Id. at 1263 (citation, footnote, and internal quotation marks omitted). 11 threats context is unworkable, because there would in many instances be no way to determine whether a threat conveyed “serious bodily harm” or just “bodily harm,” unlike the circumstances we confront in the more objective assault context.7 Even in the case at hand, it is unclear and possibly unknowable whether appellant’s statements to Ms. Brown that he was going to smack the “s” out of her and get her “fed up” threatened “serious bodily harm,” under the definition appellant advocates (“[A] substantial risk of death, unconsciousness, extreme physical pain, protracted and obvious disfigurement, or protracted loss or impairment of the function of a bodily member, organ or mental faculty.” Nixon, supra note 4, 730 A.2d at 149 (citations omitted)).8 7 For example, the defendant in Clark v. United States, 755 A.2d 1026, 1028 (D.C. 2000), threatened a police officer by saying, “You won’t work anywhere after I tell the boys,” which the officer took to mean that the defendant would arrange for his “boys” “to do something to her so that she would be physically incapacitated from working.” In this context, there is no way of knowing whether this threat by the defendant threatened “serious bodily harm.” Similarly, the same issue arises in the context of hand gestures conveyed to another in a threatening fashion. Cf. Ebron v. United States, 838 A.2d 1140, 1151-52 (D.C. 2003) (appellant’s hand movement from his “chin to his throat” was a threat towards a witness that was admissible to show consciousness of guilt). 8 In fact, we have avoided similar arguments previously made that “serious bodily harm” should track the definition of “serious bodily injury” found in our aggravated assault cases. See, e.g., Jenkins v. United States, 902 A.2d 79, 86-87 n.10 (D.C. 2006) (“In using the phrase ‘serious bodily harm’ . . . we did not (continued…) 12 For these reasons, we hold that the crime of misdemeanor threats does not require proof that a defendant threatened “serious bodily harm,” as opposed to “bodily harm.” Usage of the phrase “serious bodily harm” found in some of our case law and in the Criminal Jury Instructions does not impose a different burden of proof. Rather, “our statements appear to be no more than particularly wellentrenched dicta, and we are not bound by them.” Buchanan v. United States, 32 A.3d 990, 1001-02 (D.C. 2011) (citations, footnote, and internal quotation marks omitted). Appellant’s attempted threats conviction is thus affirmed.