Opinion ID: 2524706
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Defendant's Section 288a Conviction Is a Strike

Text: A strike under the Three Strikes law is a prior conviction for any offense that, as of June 30, 1993 (§ 667, subd. (h)), was defined in subdivision (c) of Section 667.5 as a violent felony or ... defined in subdivision (c) of Section 1192.7 as a serious felony in this state. (§ 667, subd. (d)(1).) In arguing that defendant's prior conviction under section 288a, subdivision (c), for oral copulation with a child under 14 years of age is a strike, the Attorney General relies principally on subdivision (c)(6) of section 1192.7 (section 1192.7(c)(6)). Under section 1192.7(c)(6), a lewd or lascivious act on a child under the age of 14 years is a serious felony. Citing People v. Henderson (1987) 195 Cal. App.3d 1235, 241 Cal.Rptr. 461, the Attorney General argues that an act of oral copulation with a child under 14 years of age is lewd per se, i.e., it necessarily constitutes a lewd act on a child within the meaning of section 1192.7(c)(6). Defendant disagrees, arguing that the language of section 1192.7(c)(6)lewd or lascivious act on a child under the age of 14 yearsis an obvious preference ... to a violation of section 288, subdivision (a). The latter section provides in relevant part: Any person who willfully and lewdly commits any lewd or lascivious act ... upon or with the body, or any part or member thereof, of a child who is under the age of 14 years, with the intent of arousing, appealing to, or gratifying the lust, passions, or sexual desires of that person or the child, is guilty of a felony.... (§ 288, subd. (a).) Defendant reasons that because this language closely matches the language of section 1192.7(c)(6), the `serious felony' that section 1192.7(c)(6) defines is a violation of section 288, subdivision (a). Defendant then asserts that because section 288, subdivision (a), necessarily includes the specific intent to arouse, appeal to, or gratify the lust, passions or sexual desires of one of the participants and oral copulation of a child under section 288a, subdivision (c), is a general intent crime, it is possible to commit a violation of section 288a, subdivision (c) without committing a lewd or lascivious act upon a child under 14. Thus, defendant asserts, his conviction under section 288a, subdivision (c), is not a serious felony conviction under section 1192.7(c)(6). As in any case involving statutory interpretation, our fundamental task here is to determine the Legislature's intent so as to effectuate the law's purpose. ( White v. Ultramar, Inc. (1999) 21 Cal.4th 563, 572, 88 Cal.Rptr.2d 19, 981 P.2d 944.) We begin by examining the statute's words, giving them a plain and commonsense meaning. ( Garcia v. McCutchen (1997) 16 Cal.4th 469, 476, 66 Cal.Rptr.2d 319, 940 P.2d 906.) We do not, however, consider the statutory language in isolation. ( Lungren v. Deukmejian (1988) 45 Cal.3d 727, 735, 248 Cal.Rptr. 115, 755 P.2d 299.) Rather, we look to the entire substance of the statute ... in order to determine the scope and purpose of the provision.... [Citation.] ( West Pico Furniture Co. v. Pacific Finance Loans (1970) 2 Cal.3d 594, 608, 86 Cal.Rptr. 793, 469 P.2d 665.) That is, we construe the words in question `in context, keeping in mind the nature and obvious purpose of the statute....' [Citation.] ( Ibid. ) We must harmonize the various parts of a statutory enactment ... by considering the particular clause or section in the context of the statutory framework as a whole. ( Moyer v. Workmen's Comp. Appeals Bd. (1973) 10 Cal.3d 222, 230, 110 Cal.Rptr. 144, 514 P.2d 1224; see also Woods v. Young (1991) 53 Cal.3d 315, 323, 279 Cal.Rptr. 613, 807 P.2d 455; Title Ins. & Trust Co. v. County of Riverside (1989) 48 Cal.3d 84, 91, 255 Cal.Rptr. 670, 767 P.2d 1148; Dyna-Med, Inc. v. Fair Employment & Housing Com. (1987) 43 Cal.3d 1379, 1387, 241 Cal.Rptr. 67, 743 P.2d 1323.) Applying these principles, we disagree with defendant. We first observe that defendant's argument is inconsistent with the plain language of section 1192.7(c)(6). An act of oral copulation on a child under 14 years of age by a person more than 10 years older than the child is a lewd or lascivious act under the common and ordinary meaning of those words. [2] Moreover, as defendant acknowledges, section 1192.7(c)(6) contains no direct reference to section 288. By contrast, both the electorate and the Legislature have enacted other criminal statutes that define the triggering conduct or circumstance by express reference to a lewd and/or lascivious act on a child in violation of [s]ection 288. (§§ 190.2, subd. (a)(17)(E) [lewd or lascivious act upon the person of a child under the age of 14 years in violation of Section 288], 999?, subd. (a) [lewd acts on a child under 14, in violation of Section 288], 1202.1, subd. (e)(6) [[l]ewd or lascivious acts with a child in violation of Section 288], 2962, subd. (e)(2)(I) [[l]ewd acts on a child under the age of 14 years in violation of Section 288], 11160, subd. (d)(20) [[l]ewd and lascivious acts with a child, in violation of Section 288].) Thus, the electorate and the Legislature have both shown that they know how to use language expressly requiring a violation of section 288 when that is their intent. The omission of such language from section 1192.7(c)(6)which the voters enacted by initiative and the Legislature subsequently amendedundermines defendant's assertion that it obvious[ly] refer[s] ... to a violation of section 288, subdivision (a). Indeed, defendant concedes that this omission argu[ably] shows an inten[t] to broaden the number and type of acts that f[a]ll within the purview of section 1192.7(c)(6) beyond those acts within section 288's scope. In resisting the statute's plain language, defendant relies in part on the Legislature's 1986 revision of section 1192.7(c)(6). As originally enacted in 1982 through Proposition 8, section 1192.7(e)(6) defined the term serious felony to include lewd acts on a child under the age of 14 years. (Former § 1192.7(c)(6), added by Prop. 8, § 7, enacted by voters, Primary Elec.(June 8, 1982).) In 1986, the Legislature revised this provision into its current form: lewd or lascivious act on a child under the age of 14 years. (§ 1192.7(c)(6), as amended by Stats.1986, ch. 489, § 1, p. 1809, italics added.) According to defendant, the amended statute's use [of] the precise statutory language from the definition of a violation of section 288, subdivision (a) shows that the Legislature intended [section 1192.7(c)(6) ] to identify ... the felony defined in section 288, subdivision (a). We find defendant's analysis unpersuasive. Defendant is correct that the amended version of section 1192.7(c)(6) precisely matched some of the language of section 288, subdivision (a): the single phrase, lewd or lascivious act. However, it did not match all of section 288, subdivision (a)'s language; as relevant here, it omitted the requirement that the perpetrator acted with the intent of arousing, appealing to, or gratifying the lust, passions, or sexual desires of that person or the child (§ 288, subd. (a).) By contrast, the same 1986 legislation also reworded subdivision (c)(18) of section 1192.7 to completely duplicate[ ] the definition of first degree burglary in effect at the time.... ( People v. Cruz (1996) 13 Cal.4th 764, 768, 55 Cal.Rptr.2d 117, 919 P.2d 731.) This difference suggests that the Legislature did not, as defendant asserts, intend the 1986 revision of section 1192.7(c)(6) to identify ... the felony defined in section 288, subdivision (a). Had that been the Legislature's intent, it most likely would have either expressly referenced a violation of section 288 or, as it did in simultaneously revising the subdivision relating to first degree burglary, incorporated all of section 288, subdivision (a)'s language. [3] In support of his interpretation, defendant also suggests that limiting section 1192.7(c)(6) to violations of section 288, subdivision (a), is consistent with the structure of section 1192.7, subdivision (c). According to defendant, [a]U of the other `serious felonies' set forth in subdivision (c) of section 1192.7 describe specific offenses, or offenses that are committed in a specific manner.... There is no other `serious felony' listed in subdivision (c) of section 1192.7 where a broad category of conduct is proscribed. Defendant's argument fails to recognize that in prior decisions construing section 1192.7 we `rejected the view that section[] ... 1192.7 consists] only of specific statutory offenses and enhancements. In so doing, [we] noted that although Proposition 8's serious felony enhancement provisions appear to be largely based upon section 12021.1, subdivision (b)'s list of violent offenses, they also include items describing nonviolent criminal conduct which do not precisely correspond to the elements of any preexisting criminal offense. [Citation.] [We] reasoned [that] the inclusion of these items evidenced the voter's intention to deter certain criminal conduct regardless of whether it refers to specific criminal offenses because it is perceived as dangerous and deserving of additional punishment when committed by recidivists. [We] therefore concluded [that] the enhancement provisions enacted by Proposition 8 refer to the criminal conduct described therein, not to specific criminal offenses and thus these provisions apply whenever the prosecution pleads and proves the specified conduct. [Citation.]' (Italics in original.) [Citation.] { People v. Equarte (1986) 42 Cal.3d 456, 463-64, 229 Cal.Rptr. 116, 722 P.2d 890.) Defendant also relies on our decision in Martinez, supra, 11 Cal.4th 434, 45 Cal. Rptr.2d 905, 903 P.2d 1037. Citing Martinez, he asserts that [a]n act with an underage child becomes `lewd or lascivious' depending entirely upon the sexual motivation and intent with which it is committed. Accordingly, defendant asserts, to constitute a `lewd or lascivious act on a child under 14 years' [within the meaning of section 1192.7(c)(6)], there is a specific intent that must accompany the act. That specific intent element is entirely missing from a violation of section 288a. Defendant misconstrues Martinez. There, the defendant argued that section 288's express termsany lewd or lascivious act committed with the intent of arousing, appealing to, or gratifying the lust, passions, or sexual desires of [the perpetrator] or the childrequire proof of both an inherently lewd or lascivious act and the specified sexual `intent.' ( Martinez, supra, 11 Cal.4th at p. 442, 45 Cal.Rptr.2d 905, 903 P.2d 1037.) We rejected this argument and reaffirmed the long-held view that `any touching' of an underage child committed with the intent to sexually arouse either the defendant or the child establishes a section 288 violation. ( Martinez, supra, 11 Cal.4th at p. 442, 45 Cal.Rptr.2d 905, 903 P.2d 1037.) As defendant observes, in reaching this conclusion, we stated: [W]e can only conclude that the touching of an underage child is `lewd or lascivious' and `lewdly' performed depending entirely upon the sexual motivation and intent with which it is committed. ( Id. at p. 449, 45 Cal. Rptr.2d 905, 903 P.2d 1037.) Defendant's argument takes this statement out of context. As our opinion explained, we granted review in Martinez for the limited purpose of determining the acts necessary to sustain a conviction under ... section 288. ( Martinez, supra, 11 Cal.4th at p. 438, 45 Cal.Rptr.2d 905, 903 P.2d 1037.) In making this determination, we stressed the basic purpose of that statute: to provide children with `special protection' from sexual exploitation because they are `uniquely susceptible' to such abuse and suffer profound harm whenever they are perceived and used as objects of sexual desire. [Citation.] ... [S]uch concerns cannot be satisfied unless the kinds of sexual misconduct that result in criminal liability are greatly expanded where children are concerned. ( Id at pp. 443-444, 45 Cal.Rptr.2d 905, 903 P.2d 1037.) We found this purpose reflected in section 288's broad and amorphous language, which differs markedly from other statutes in the same `family' of crimes. [Citation.] In particular, other felony sex offenses prohibit the commission of certain clearly specified acts ... [and] describe[ ] the criminal act in precise and clinical terms. ( Martinez, supra, 11 Cal.4th at pp. 442-43, 45 Cal.Rptr.2d 905, 903 P.2d 1037.) We concluded that the absence of such precise language in section 288 was deliberate and disclosed the Legislature's intent to include sexually motivated conduct not made criminal elsewhere in the scheme. [Citation.] ( Martinez, supra, 11 Cal.4th at p. 443, 45 Cal. Rptr.2d 905, 903 P.2d 1037.) We then explained that although children are routinely cuddled, disrobed, stroked, examined, and groomed as part of a normal and healthy upbringing, these intimate acts may also be undertaken for the purpose of sexual arousal. Thus, depending upon the actor's motivation, innocent or sexual, such behavior may fall within or without the protective purposes of section 288. ( Martinez, supra, 11 Cal.4th at p. 450, 45 Cal. Rptr.2d 905, 903 P.2d 1037.) Given all of these considerations, we reaffirmed that the `gist' of the crime section 288 defines is the defendant's intent to sexually exploit a child, not the nature of the offending act. [Citation.] ( Martinez, supra, 11 Cal.4th at p. 444, 45 Cal.Rptr.2d 905, 903 P.2d 1037.) We thus concluded that the lewd character of an activity cannot logically be determined separate and apart from the perpetrator's intent.... [A]ny other construction could exempt a potentially broad range of sexually motivated and harmful contact from the statute's reach. In light of the statutory purpose, we cannot conceive that the Legislature intended such a result. [Fn. omitted.] ( Id, at p. 450, 45 Cal.Rptr.2d 905, 903 P.2d 1037.) Understood in this context, the statement defendant cites from Martinez, supra, 11 Cal.4th at page 450, 45 Cal. Rptr.2d 905, 903 P.2d 1037, does not establish that whether an act is lewd or lascivious within the meaning of section 1192.7(c)(6 ) depend[s] entirely upon the [perpetrator's] sexual motivation and intent. Martinez defined lewd or lascivious act only for purposes of applying section 288 and in light of that statute's basic purpose: to expand the kinds of criminal sexual misconduct where children are concerned by reaching sexually motivated conduct not otherwise made criminal. Section 288 thus is part of a statutory scheme that recognizes that some touchings of children are always harmful and improper, whereas others may or may not be, depending upon the actor's intent. To address the former, the Legislature passed statuteslike section 288a, subdivision (c)(1)that precisely describe the inherently harmful acts and prohibit them in all circumstances. To address the latter, the Legislature passed section 288. And, to implement this statutory scheme, Martinez reaffirmed a broad definition of a lewd or lascivious act that includes any touching committed with the intent section 288 describes, so as to extend protection beyond the inherently lewd acts precisely described and prohibited by the other statutes in the family of felony sex offenses. Defendant thus errs in now attempting to use Martinez 's expanded definition to narrow section 1192.7(c)(6) and to exclude from its scope oral copulation on a child, which is an act that is always harmful, always improper, and always lewd, regardless of the perpetrator's intent. Although section 1192.7(c)(6) certainly includes acts that, because of the perpetrator's intent, are lewd or lascivious under Martinez and section 288, it is not limited to those acts. [4] Indeed, our decision in People v. Pearson (1986) 42 Cal.3d 351, 228 Cal.Rptr. 509, 721 P.2d 595, which defendant cites, is inconsistent with his argument that precisely described criminal acts like oral copulation on a child are not lewd or lascivious where the perpetrator lacks the intent section 288 specifies. In Pearson, we held that the offense section 288 describes is not a lesser included offense of statutory sodomy with a child under the age of 14 years (§ 286). ( Pearson, supra, 42 Cal.3d at p. 355, 228 Cal.Rptr. 509, 721 P.2d 595.) Arguing to the contrary, the defendant in Pearson asserted that `it is inconceivable that a person can engage in sodomy on a child without at the same time committing a lewd and lascivious act on that child.' ( Id. at p. 356, 228 Cal.Rptr. 509, 721 P.2d 595.) We agreed that defendant's assertion was accurate in a moral sense.... ( Ibid. ) However, we also found ... that as sodomy is a general intent crime, while a lewd act on a child [under section 288] requires proof of the specific intent that the statute describes, the latter is not necessarily included in the former. ( People v. Griffin (1988) 46 Cal.3d 1011, 1030, 251 Cal.Rptr. 643, 761 P.2d 103.) We find no evidence that when the voters enacted section 1192.7(c)(6) or when the Legislature amended it, they understood and used the term lewd other than in its moral sense, which unquestionably includes defendant's act of orally copulating a child under 14 years of age. Indeed, in other statutes, the Legislature has characterized oral copulation on a child as sexual assault (Pen. Code,§ 11165.1, subd. (a); Evid.Code, § 1036.2; Code Civ. Proc, §§ 128, subd. (d), 1219, subd. (d)(1)), sexual abuse (Pen. Code,§ 11165.1, subd. (a)), a sexually violent offense (Welf. & Inst.Code, § 6600.1), and substantial sexual conduct (Pen. Code, § 1203.066, subd. (b)). In contrast, defendant's construction of section 1192.7(c)(6) would produce a result inconsistent with what he maintains was the voters' intent in enacting section 1192.7: to distinguish between those felony charges that were deemed `serious,' and those that were not, and to prohibit plea bargaining for the former. Defendant fails to explain how this purpose would be served by excluding from the statute's reach an act of oral copulation on a child under 14 years of age by a person more than 10 years older than the child. Such an act, with its destructive impact on the child, is no less serious under the theoretical circumstance defendant suggests, i.e., the perpetrator's intent is sadistic rather than sexual. The same is true of an act of sodomy on a child under 14 years of age by a person more than 10 years older than the child (§ 286, subd. (c)(1)); [a] child victim suffers no less from ... sodomy undertaken for the purpose of punishment than he or she does from ... sodomy performed for the purpose of sexual gratification. ( People v. Whitham (1995) 38 Cal.App.4th 1282, 1293, 45 Cal.Rptr.2d 571.) Yet, under defendant's interpretation, sodomy on a child also would not be a serious felony within the meaning of section 1192.7 absent proof of the perpetrator's sexual intent. Thus, defendant's construction of section 1192.7(c)(6) would not serve the very statutory purpose he identifies, i.e., to specify those serious felonies for which plea bargaining is prohibited. Moreover, because we cannot conceive that the voters or the Legislature intended to make the perpetrator's intent determinative of whether oral copulation and sodomy on a child are lewd or lascivious acts under section 1192.7(c)(6), we do not agree with defendant that his construction is one that the statute's `language and the circumstances of its application may reasonably permit.' Finally, we reject defendant's suggestion that our construction of section 1192.7(c)(6) renders the statute ambiguous in the extreme and unconstitutionally vague. Defendant argues that a criminal whose victim is under 14 is left to guess at whether a conviction he suffers will be treated as a `strike' in the future. We need only respond that defendant acted under no such uncertainty here; he cannot reasonably or justifiably maintain that he was left to guess as to whether orally copulating a child under 14 was a lewd or lascivious act. Indeed, he does not even argue otherwise. Rather, in raising the vagueness issue, he states: For example, the uncertainty in a felony conviction of section 647.6, could not be resolved at the time of the conviction, but would depend upon what information was put in the record, and how a court in the future viewed the defendant's intent. However, a defendant who falls squarely within the reach of a statute lacks standing to challenge its vagueness as it might be hypothetically applied to the conduct of others.... ( Parker v. Levy (1974) 417 U.S. 733, 756, 94 S.Ct. 2547, 41 L.Ed.2d 439.) We are not obliged to `consider every conceivable situation that might arise' under a statute's language if we can give it a `reasonable and practical construction' that accords with the drafters' probable intent and encompasses the defendant's conduct. ( Bowland v. Municipal Court (1976) 18 Cal.3d 479, 492, 134 Cal.Rptr. 630, 556 P.2d 1081.) Here, because section 1192.7(c)(6) clearly applies to [defendant's] conduct, and he does not argue that it improperly prohibits a substantial amount of constitutionally protected conduct, he may not challenge it on vagueness grounds. ( Tobe v. City of Santa Ana (1995) 9 Cal.4th 1069, 1095, 40 Cal.Rptr.2d 402, 892 P.2d 1145.) Thus, we conclude that the trial court correctly found defendant's prior conviction under section 288a, subdivision (c), to be a strike under the Three Strikes law. [5]