Court Opinion

ID: 9663084
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 23:27:20.629964+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:14:45.473394
License: Public Domain

MEYERS, Judge,
dissenting.
What disturbs me most about the Court’s lead opinion is the ease with which it disregards Lugo-Lugo v. State, 650 S.W.2d 72 (Tex.Crim.App.1983) (Clinton, J., concurring) 1, and its progeny, especially since the principles articulated in those eases control the issue in dispute today.
In order to convict an individual of a charged offense, the state must prove all components of that offense. Offenses vary in *8that some require only specific, proscribed conduct for culpability, while others demand that certain circumstances surround, or specific results flow, from that conduct. Still others require the existence of all such elements before the state can obtain a conviction. See generally Lugo-Lugo v. State, 650 S.W.2d 72 (Tex.Crim.App.1983) (Clinton, J., concurring).
And yet, guilt does not flow solely from these physical components of behavior. Indeed, unless clear language exists to the contrary, the state must also show that the accused had a culpable mental state when she committed the actions that comprise any particular offense. Braxton v. State, 528 S.W.2d 844, 846 (Tex.Crim.App.1975). The existence of this mental state is so central to the idea of ultimate culpability that
[i]f the definition of an offense does not prescribe a culpable mental state, a culpable mental state is nevertheless required unless the definition plainly dispenses with any mental element.
TexPenal Code § 6.02(b).
It is not enough, however, that the culpable mental state attach to only one element of the offense. Instead, as Judge Clinton stated in Lugo-Lugo, 650 S.W.2d at 87 (Tex.Crim.App.1983), each element of conduct requires “some genre of culpability.” His Lugo-Lugo concurrence identified the parts of an offense as the “nature of conduct,” the “circumstances surrounding conduct,” and the “result of conduct.” Id. at 86. These “elements of conduct” were gleaned from TexPenal Code § 6.03, which defines the culpable mental states applicable to offenses under our law. See Lugo-Lugo, 650 S.W.2d at 86 n. 1.
The Lugo-bugo concurrence found that the “result of conduct” in the statute proscribing murder did not require a lesser culpable mental state than intent. Id. at 89. See TexPenal Code § 19.02(a)(2). Thus, the word “intending” in that statute could legitimately modify and provide the culpable mental state for both the “nature of conduct” and the “result of conduct” such that the indictment underlying the appellant’s conviction was “fundamentally sufficient to support a conviction.” Id.
Similarly, in Alvarado v. State, 704 S.W.2d 36, 40 (Tex.Crim.App.1985), this Court addressed the “result of conduct” element, stating that the jury could not convict the appellant under TexPenal Code § 22.04, the statute prohibiting injury to a child, elderly or disabled individual, merely upon a showing that she knowingly or intentionally placed her child in “a tub of hot water.” Instead, emphasizing that the “result of conduct,” and not the “nature of conduct,” constitutes the core of § 22.04, this court required that the culpable mental state (knowingly or intentionally) extend to the “result of conduct.” Id. at 39-40. See also Beggs v. State, 597 S.W.2d 375, 377 (Tex.Crim.App.1980).
Although the instant case, unlike Lugo-Lugo and Alvarado, deals not with the “result of conduct,” but rather with the “circumstances surrounding conduct,” the principles of Lugo-Lugo and Alvarado still apply:
Obviously, circumstances surrounding conduct could make an otherwise benign act dangerous. Thus, if we were to determine the phrase in issue is a ‘circumstance surrounding the conduct,’ an additional culpable mental state as to that ‘conduct element’ would be required.
Lugo-Lugo, 650 S.W.2d at 88. In fact, in McClain v. State, 687 S.W.2d 350, 354 (Tex. Crim.App.1985) this court held that TexPe-nal Code § 31.03, proscribing theft, required “proof of the actor’s knowledge of [the] ‘circumstances surrounding conduct.’ ” Thus, § 31.03 demands not only that the appellant appropriate property without the owner’s effective consent, but also that he know that the owner did not consent. We reiterated this point in McQueen v. State, 781 S.W.2d 600 (Tex.Crim.App.1989), when we held that the culpable mental state of “knowingly” must apply to the surrounding circumstances in the statute prohibiting the unauthorized use of a motor vehicle. See Tex.Penal Code § 31.07; Gardner v. State, 780 S.W.2d 259, 263 (Tex.Crim.App.1989).
That said, TexPenal Code § 22.041(b), the statute at issue in this case, states:
A person commits an offense if, having custody, care, or control of a child younger *9than 15 years, he intentionally abandons the child in any place under circumstances that expose the child to an unreasonable risk of harm.
The above statute, proscribing child abandonment under “circumstances that expose the child to an unreasonable risk of harm,” does not designate a culpable mental state to these circumstances. When an offense does not assign a culpable mental state for a particular element of the offense, Tex.Penal Code § 6.02(c) provides that intent, knowledge, or recklessness suffices to establish criminal responsibility. The “intentionally” that precedes “abandons” in § 22.041(b) cannot be imputed to the circumstances surrounding abandonment, as “... a person [cannot] ‘intend’ ‘circumstances surrounding [her] conduct.’ ” Lugo-Lugo, 650 S.W.2d at 87. It follows that the State must prove knowledge or, at a minimum, recklessness, as to the circumstances surrounding the abandonment of a child, in order to convict a person under § 22.041(b). Accordingly, in the instant cause, the trial judge should have included an explicit direction on the culpable mental states properly associated with each element of conduct within § 22.041(b), including the “circumstances surrounding conduct.”
I will admit that the application of McClain and McQueen to § 22.041 is less than straightforward. The reason is that the statute contains two different sets of circumstances, one in the definition of the offense itself {See § 22.041(b) above) and one in the definition of “abandon” (§ 22.041(a)):
(a) In this section, “abandon” means to leave a child in any place without providing reasonable and necessary care for the child, under circumstances under which no reasonable, similarly situated adult would leave a child of that age and ability.
Tex.Penal Code § 22.041 thus provides a “dangerous” set of circumstances in § 22.041(b) and a set of circumstances properly characterized as “unreasonable” in § 22.041(a).2 The Court attempts to equate “dangerous” with “unreasonable.”3 It may, however, want to consult a dictionary before creating this new set of synonyms. Unreasonable circumstances are sometimes, but certainly not always, dangerous. For example, it may be unreasonable to leave a ten year old child with his twenty year old sister at her college dormitory, where she and her friends are discussing how they intend to carry out a crime they have been planning. But, however morally bothersome one may believe such circumstances to be, they can hardly be deemed dangerous.
The Court, however, may only intend to assert that the circumstance clause in § 22.041(b) is a subset of that in § 22.041(a), in that dangerous circumstances, as described in § 22.041(b), will always also constitute unreasonable circumstances, as described in § 22.041(a). Because of this, and as the Court correctly notes, I do not believe that the meaning and effect of § 22.041 would be any different had the legislature used the word “leaves” in § 22.041(b) as opposed to “abandons.”4 The Court, however, believes that “abandon” has a special meaning in that it proposes a certain set of “objectively unreasonable circumstances.” Although correct in this assertion (i.e: the “unreasonableness” of the circumstances does not result from whether any given defendant thought they were unreasonable, but, rather, from a sense of whether the hypothetical reasonable person would have *10deemed those circumstances unreasonable), the Court never explains why it makes a difference. In fact, when referring to “circumstances surrounding conduct,” the tenets of Lugo-Lugo and its progeny apply only to objective circumstances. For example, an application of the principles in Lugo-Lugo would make no sense if the child abandonment statute read, in its entirety:
A person commits an offense if, having custody, care, or control of a child younger than 15 years, he intentionally abandons the child under any circumstances he believes are unreasonable.
Although one may not be able to imagine such a statute, the point still remains the same: Merely identifying circumstances as “objectively unreasonable” in no way changes the fact that, pursuant to the principles articulated in Lugo-Lugo and later reiterated by this Court in numerous majority opinions, a culpable mental state must attach to those circumstances, unless plainly dispensed with by the statute. Thus, the trial judge in the instant case should have directed jurors as to the appropriate culpable mental necessary for all the elements of conduct in Tex.Penal Code § 22.041, including the “circumstances surrounding conduct.”
The Court cannot circumvent the requirements of Lugo-Lugo and its progeny, specifically McQueen and McClain, by concluding that “according to the plain language of § 22.041, the fact that ‘intentionally’ immediately precedes ‘abandons’ means that the prescribed mental state is connected with the act of abandonment itself.” Majority op. at 2-3. As this Court stated in McQueen, a conviction under § 31.07, the statute at issue in that case, requires not only that a defendant knowingly operate another’s motor vehicle without the owner’s consent, but also that the defendant know she lacked the owner’s consent, despite the fact that the culpable mental state does not “syntactically modify the circumstances surrounding conduct but instead precedes the act of operating a vehicle.” McQueen, 781 S.W.2d at 603-04.
Nor can the Court distinguish McQueen by implying that child abandonment, in and of itself, constitutes non-innocent behavior. In McQueen, this Court stated that a culpable mental state need only attach to the “circumstances surrounding conduct” when “otherwise innocent behavior becomes criminal because of the circumstances under which it is done ...” McQueen, 781 S.W.2d at 603. According to the Court, the abandonment of a child is non-innocent behavior and, thus, no culpable mental state need attach to the dangerous circumstances surrounding that behavior. Since I interpret “innocent” to mean behavior that is not criminal, I am puzzled as to why the Court thinks the intentional abandonment of a child is anything other than innocent. The intentional abandonment of a child, in and of itself, is not labelled a “crime.” Thus, it is not a crime. TexPenal Code § 1.03(a). In fact, culpability only attaches to the intentional abandonment of a child when the child is abandoned “under circumstances that expose the child to an unreasonable risk of harm.” TexPenal Code § 22.041(b). Thus, in § 22.041(b), innocent behavior becomes criminal via the circumstances under which that behavior occurs and McQueen applies with full effect.
Finally, in the instant case, the Court relies heavily upon legislative history in vigorously arguing that the legislature intended to punish only the specific conduct of abandonment. As the Court correctly asserts, the legislative history indicates that the legislature wanted to punish the abandonment of a child even when that abandonment does not lead to the death or injury of the child. However, a reading of § 22.041(b) that demands a culpable mental state for both the abandonment of a child and the dangerous circumstances surrounding that abandonment is consistent with the supposed intent of the legislature to prohibit action other than that leading to the death, injury or serious illness of the child. This understanding of § 22.041(b) prohibits the behavior of an individual when that person intentionally leaves her child alone and is aware of, but consciously disregards, an unreasonable risk of harm to that child, regardless of whether the child is injured in any way from the abandonment.
Unlike the Court, I do not think the legislative history addresses the pertinent inquiry *11in this ease: Whether, given that certain circumstances must exist in order to constitute an offense under § 22.041(b), the statute requires a culpable mental state as to those circumstances.5 While I am impressed with the Court’s spirited dedication to ensuring that we effectuate the intent of the legislature, the intent of the legislature in this instance is simply unclear. In this regard, I suggest that the Court redirect its energy toward assuring that a culpable mental state attach to the circumstances surrounding the intentional abandonment of a child unless plainly dispensed with by § 22.041 since, unlike that of the legislature, the intent of this Court in both McClain and McQueen remains clear.
The Court’s failure to effectively confront these controlling cases is disappointing. Lawyers and judges depend on this Court to clarify the criminal law of this State. Plurality opinions like this one, because they are “of limited precedential value,” are always a poor vehicle in this regard. Farris v. State, 819 S.W.2d 490, 502 n. 3 (Tex.Crim.App.1990). But when the Court also fails to meaningfully distinguish the case before it from the numerous majority opinions forming a decisive body of case law in this area, the disservice to bench and bar is especially egregious.
With these comments, I dissent.

. Although a concurring opinion, Lugo-Lugo provided the blue-print that informed all of the subsequent majority opinions cited within this opinion. Thus, the premises of Lugo-Lugo have been adopted as a rule of law in this State.

. I characterize the circumstances in § 22.041(a) as unreasonable because they are circumstances under which no similarly situated reasonable adult would leave a child.

. I am specifically referring to the sentence, "[t]he statute makes this so by defining ‘abandon’ as leaving a child under circumstances under which no reasonable, similarly situated adult would do so, that is, in dangerous circumstances " (emphasis added). Perhaps the Court meant "for example” as opposed to “that is.” See Majority op. at 4.

.If my interpretation of the statute renders portions of the definition of "abandonment” redundant, then so be it. See Tex.Gov’t.Code § 311.021(2). I can only emphasize that the Court’s all inclusive interpretation only gains credibility if they effectively interpret § 22.041(a) as plainly dispensing with the culpable mental state that must otherwise necessarily attach to the dangerous circumstances surrounding the abandonment in § 22.041(b). TexPenal Code § 6.02(b). As explained below, merely characterizing the circumstances in § 22.041(a) as "objectively unreasonable” in no way dispenses with this necessary culpable mental state.

. The Court's attempt to reveal the legislature’s intent via legislative history seems to deal not with child abandonment, but with child endangerment, as the Court itself notes. See Majority op. at 3-4 n. 4