Opinion ID: 784434
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: The Kidnapping Charge

Text: 76 Under Arizona law, [a] person commits kidnapping by knowingly restraining another person with the intent to... [i]nflict ... a sexual offense on the victim. Ariz.Rev.Stat. § 13-1304. With respect to the kidnapping statute, 77 [r]estrain means to restrict a person's movements without consent, without legal authority, and in a manner which interferes substantially with such person's liberty, by either moving such person from one place to another or by confining such person. 78 Ariz.Rev.Stat. § 13-1301(2). Johnson argues that the kidnapping charge should have been dismissed because he did not `restrain' Ms. Amaya[-Flores] as the word is defined in § 13-1301(2) because at all relevant times he had `legal authority,' and indeed an absolute duty, to restrain her. We review de novo the district court's interpretation of Arizona's kidnapping statute. Salve Regina Coll. v. Russell, 499 U.S. 225, 239, 111 S.Ct. 1217, 113 L.Ed.2d 190 (1991). 79 The Arizona Supreme Court has explained that the legal authority referred to in the kidnapping statute implies that behavior is sanctioned by law. State v. Viramontes, 163 Ariz. 334, 788 P.2d 67, 71 (1990). As the Arizona Supreme Court is the ultimate expositor[] of [Arizona] law, we are bound by its construction of the statute. Wilbur, 421 U.S. at 691, 95 S.Ct. 1881. According to Johnson's own testimony, of course[it is] not acceptable Border Patrol behavior to allow aliens to strip in front of you out in the desert. Johnson further testified that there was no Border Patrol reason for him to have had custody of Amaya-Flores when the oral sex occurred. While Johnson had legal authority to detain Amaya-Flores when she was first apprehended, he had no legal authority to continue to confine her in the back of his patrol car, to drive her to a remote spot in the desert, to handcuff her while she performed oral sex, and then to take her to the Naco border crossing roughly twenty five miles west of his ordinary duty station. 80 AFFIRMED.