Opinion ID: 2336124
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: instructions on third-degree assault.

Text: Appellant assigns error with respect to the instructions on assault in the third degree pertaining to two police officers, Matthew Glass and Bill Green. Appellant was convicted of third-degree assault only as to Officer Green; he was convicted of first-degree assault as to Officer Glass. Pursuant to KRS 508.025(1)(a)1, a person is guilty of third-degree assault when he [r]ecklessly, with a deadly weapon or a dangerous instrument, or intentionally causes or attempts to cause physical injury to ... [a] state, county, city, or federal peace officer. The offense is identical to fourth-degree assault, KRS 508.030, except that the victim's status as a peace officer enhances the offense from a Class A misdemeanor to a Class D felony. While KRS 508.025(1)(a)1 recites a culpable mental state with respect to the defendant's act and the result thereof (intent or recklessness), it does not recite a culpable mental state with respect to the enhancing element, i.e., the status of the victim as a peace officer. Appellant tendered third-degree assault instructions that would have required the jury to find him guilty of that offense if he recklessly caused physical injury to the officers while they were acting in the course of their official duties and if he knew they were so acting at the time of the offense. See 1 Cooper, Kentucky Instructions to Juries (Criminal) § 3.47, at 114-15 (4th ed. Anderson 1993). Instead, the jury was instructed to find Appellant guilty of third-degree assault if he recklessly caused physical injury to the officers while they were acting in the line of duty. Thus, the instructions did not require a culpable mental state with respect to the status of the victims, but imposed absolute liability as to that element of the offense. Per KRS 501.030(2), a person cannot be found guilty of a criminal offense unless that person has engaged in such conduct intentionally, knowingly, wantonly or recklessly as the law may require, with respect to each element of the offense, except that this requirement does not apply to any offense which imposes absolute liability, as defined in KRS 501.050. (Emphasis added.) KRS 501.050 provides that a person may be guilty of an offense absent a culpable mental state only if the offense is a violation or a misdemeanor, or is defined by a statute outside the penal code. By its own terms, KRS 501.050 does not apply to the offense of assault in the third degree, which is a Class D felony and defined within the penal code. Thus, KRS 508.025(1)(a)1 cannot be interpreted as imposing absolute liability with respect to any element of the defined offense. KRS 501.040 provides that [a]lthough no culpable mental state is expressly designated in a statute defining an offense, a culpable mental state may nevertheless be required for the commission of such offense, or with respect to some or all of the material elements thereof, if the proscribed conduct necessarily involves such culpable mental state. (Emphasis added.) In Covington v. Commonwealth, Ky.App., 849 S.W.2d 560 (1992), the Court of Appeals addressed the validity of that portion of KRS 508.025(1)(b) which prohibits assaults by prisoners against detention facility employees. That section does not recite a culpable mental state with respect to either the defendant's conduct or the status of the victim. In Covington , there was no issue as to the defendant's knowledge that the victim of his assault was a prison employee. The only issue was the defendant's mens rea with respect to his conduct. Citing KRS 501.040, the Court of Appeals held that, under the facts of that case, the defendant could be found guilty of third-degree assault only if he acted intentionally or wantonly with respect to his assault of the prison employee. Id. at 562. Unlike Covington , Appellant's culpable mental state with respect to both his conduct and the status of his victims was at issue in this case. Pursuant to KRS 501.040, Appellant could not be convicted of assaulting a police officer absent knowledge on his part that his victim was a police officer. Illustrative of offenses requiring a culpable mental state with respect to the status of the victim are those defining sexual offenses against children in which the age status of the child is an enhancing element of the offense, e.g., KRS 510.040(2) and KRS 510.070(2). It is a defense to those offenses that the defendant did not know the age status of the victim. KRS 510.030; see also KRS 531.330(2). Also illustrative is KRS 513.020(1)(a), which provides that arson in the first degree is committed when a person intentionally sets a fire or causes an explosion with the intent to destroy or damage a building and [t]he building is inhabited or occupied or the person has reason to believe the building may be inhabited or occupied. Though the language of the statute does not require the accused to know the building is inhabited or occupied, the 1974 Commentary interprets the statute to require such knowledge on the part of the defendant. [2] The issue then becomes what degree of knowledge is required? KRS 501.020(2) defines knowingly as follows: A person acts knowingly with respect to conduct or to a circumstance described by a statute defining an offense when he is aware that his conduct is of that nature or that the circumstance exists. (Emphasis added.) The definition is modeled on § 2.02(2)(b)(i) of the Model Penal Code. The Model Code, however, contains the following additional provision: When knowledge of the existence of a particular fact is an element of an offense, such knowledge is established if a person is aware of a high probability of its existence, unless he actually believes that it does not exist. Model Penal Code § 2.02(7) (1962). The original draft of the Kentucky Penal Code contained an identical provision, HB 197, 1972 Gen. Assem., Reg. Sess. § 15(3), but that provision was deleted from the final draft and no substitute was provided. R. Lawson, Kentucky Penal Code: The Culpable Mental States and Related Matters, 61 Ky. L.J. 657, 664 (1972-73). Thus, nothing short of actual knowledge will suffice to sustain a conviction. However, Professors Lawson and Fortune point out in their treatise that proof of circumstances that would cause a reasonable person to believe or know of the existence of a fact is evidence upon which a jury might base a finding of full knowledge of the existence of that fact. R. Lawson and W. Fortune, Kentucky Criminal Law, § 2-2(c)(1), at 45 (LEXIS 1998). In other words, though actual knowledge is required, proof of actual knowledge can be by circumstantial evidence. That proposition mirrors the holding of the pre-code case of Ellison v. Commonwealth, 190 Ky. 305, 227 S.W. 458, 461 (1921). Appellant did not testify at trial; thus, it is unknown whether he was actually aware of the group of people huddled around the injured Vinson on the east side of the wrecked minivan, or that the group included two police officers. However, two police cruisers were parked in plain view, one in the middle of the expressway, both with lights flashing. That evidence was sufficient to create an issue for the jury as to whether Appellant actually knew that police officers were on the scene and endangered by his wanton conduct. That issue should have been presented to the jury by instructions requiring the jury to believe beyond a reasonable doubt that Appellant knew that his potential victims included peace officers. The error was harmless as to Glass, because the jury found beyond a reasonable doubt that Glass sustained a serious physical injury, a finding which enhanced Appellant's offense as to him from third-degree assault to first-degree assault and rendered his status as a peace officer immaterial. [3] KRS 508.010(1). However, Appellant's conviction of third-degree assault of Green must be reversed for a new trial at which the jury shall be instructed as an element of the offense that Appellant can be convicted of third-degree assault only if he knew at the time of the assault that Green was a peace officer.