Court Opinion

ID: 9771706
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 16:51:36.128213+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:41:21.770636
License: Public Domain

LEIBSON, Justice,
dissenting in part, concurring in part.
I concur in the Majority Opinion, Parts I, II, III, Y and VI, and in the holding of our Court reversing and remanding.
I respectfully dissent from Part IV construing the word “building” in the first-degree burglary statute, KRS 511.020, as including an uninhabited structure so long as it conforms generally with the common meaning of a “building.”
The history behind the present statute, the pattern of the law of which it is a part, a common sense application of the English language, and the rule of lenity that applies in construing criminal statutes where they are ambiguous, all support the appellant’s position in this matter. The only reasonable conclusion is that the word “building” as defined in KRS 511.010(1) requires that the building is either a place “(a) [wjhere any person lives; or (b) [wjhere people assemble for purposes of business, government, education, religion, entertainment or public transportation.” The statutes intend the same restrictions on the definition of a “building” for purposes of first-degree burglary as apply to any other “structure” as referred to in the statute. For reasons to be stated, any other construction is a logical absurdity.
I. HISTORY
Historically, burglary was born into the common law as a separate substantive offense out of a desire to protect persons in the sanctity of the home. The present decision cuts it off from its historical roots.
*484To understand the historical development of the burglary offense it is helpful to read the Model Penal Code and Commentaries, American Law Institute, Part II, Article 221, pp. 59-84. Burglary is not a crime which is an end in itself. It is a crime of means, a crime committed as a step to accomplishing some other offense. This particular step along the way to the commission of another offense evolved as a separate substantive offense because it was deemed a separate and singular nature from other attempts. It was separated because of the potential danger to occupants from breaking and entering into their home, even though such injury is not the crime intended:
“The initial development of the offense of burglary, as well as much of the later expansion of the offense, probably resulted from an effort to compensate for defects of the traditional law of attempt. The common law of attempt ordinarily did not reach a person who embarked on a course of criminal behavior unless he came very close to his goal_ Moreover, even when the actor’s conduct reached the stage where an attempt was committed, penalties for attempt were disproportionately low as compared to the penalties for the completed offense.
The development and expansion of the offense of burglary provided a partial solution to these problems. Making entry with criminal intent an independent substantive offense carrying serious sanctions moved back the moment when the law could intervene in a criminal design ....
.... Thus, entry into a home at night in order to commit a theft is surely a more aggravated offense than an attempted theft standing alone, because of the additional element of personal danger that attends such conduct. On the other hand, a greatly expanded burglary statute authorizes the prosecutor and the courts to treat as burglary behavior that is distinguishable from theft or attempted theft only on purely artificial grounds.” Commentaries, supra, Id. at 62-3.
The central, operative principles as explained in the Commentaries to the Model Penal Code are that all types of unlawful breaking and entering are now included under the general heading of “burglary” but it is only those limited situations where the unlawful entry poses a danger of harm to inhabitants, or could be reasonably expected to pose such a danger, that qualify as the higher degrees of burglary, Burglary I and II.
This principle carried over from the common law into the statutory development of the burglary offense, although there were statutes which confused matters by utilizing the term in describing lesser offenses that involved unlawful breaking and entering. When the Model Penal Code was adopted in 1974, Kentucky retained the requirement of “a dwelling” in the first-degree burglary offense. As stated in KRS 511.010(2), a “ ‘[djwelling’ means a building which is usually occupied by a person lodging therein.”
Subsequent amendments of the Kentucky Penal Code in 1980 were not designed to destroy fundamental concepts, but simply to clarify the difference between burglary in the first degree and burglary in the second degree.
The logical progression of the unlawful entry statutes is destroyed when we define a “building” for purposes of first-degree burglary in broader terms than the word “dwelling” used to describe second-degree burglary. It is easy to understand the reason for expanding the concept of a “building” in the first-degree statute to include "any structure, vehicle, watercraft or aircraft” where persons live or people assemble if the unlawful entry is accompanied by one of the aggravating factors specified in subparts (a), (b) and (c) of KRS 511.020(1).1 But it is illogical to believe that the General Assembly intended to punish every unlawful entry into a building, *485even into an uninhabited or abandoned building, or into a barn, garage or shed never intended for human habitation, as a serious felony, in some instances more serious than unlawful entry into a dwelling. It is the potential danger to occupants which is the gravamen of burglary as distinguished from other unlawful entries; this was the reason behind creating burglary as a separate substantive offense from other steps along the way, steps which are punished, if at all, only as criminal attempts and only when the crime which was the object of the criminal enterprise was not accomplished. Now, under the Majority Opinion, entering an uninhabited building is punished more severely than entering an inhabited one if the offender is armed, or if, as here, the building becomes the location where the offender injures or threatens injury to a person he brings with him. The historical elements of the offense are gone.
II. STATUTORY CONSTRUCTION
KRS 511.010(1) states in pertinent part:
“ ‘Building’, in addition to its ordinary meaning, means any structure, vehicle, watercraft or aircraft:
(a) Where any person lives; or
(b) Where people assemble for purposes of business, government, education, religion, entertainment or public transportation.”
The Majority has concluded that location of the phrase “in addition to its ordinary meaning” as placed after the word “building” in KRS 511.010(1), means the qualifying language in subparagraphs (a) and (b) apply only to structures other than a building. The Majority presents no reason for treating a building differently and more severely than any other structure other than the “plain meaning” rule of statutory construction. Barns, equipment sheds, and a vast array of uninhabited and uninhabitable buildings far afield from the original burglary concept fit the ordinary English definition of the word “building” (Webster’s Ninth New Collegiate Dictionary, 1983), and thus unlawful entry into such uninhabited buildings is now construed as subject to punishment under the Burglary I statute if the person entered for an unlawful purpose “armed with explosives or a deadly weapon.” KRS 511.020(l)(a).
Surely the General Assembly did not intend such an absurdity, and our duty is to construe statutes to avoid “a hypertechnical, literal interpretation that would lead to a wholly unreasonable conclusion.” Board of Educ. v. Logan Aluminum, Inc., Ky., 764 S.W.2d 75, 80 (1989). As stated in City of Frankfort v. Triplett, Ky., 365 S.W.2d 328, 330 (1963), “[mjyopic exactitude in the construction of statutes would produce many an unfortunate and unintended result.” “When all else is said and done, common sense must not be a stranger in the house of the law.” Cantrell v. Kentucky Unemployment Insurance Commission, Ky., 450 S.W.2d 235, 237 (1970).
III. RULE OF LENITY
The ALI Model Penal Code defines the elements of burglary in the highest degree as requiring “a building or occupied structure,” and specifies that it is a “defense to the prosecution for burglary that the building or structure was abandoned.” See Model Penal Code and Commentaries, supra, Sec. 221.1, pp. 60-61. The Commentary explains:
“The important notion that ties these provisions together is that of occupan-cy_ Restricting the offense to buildings and other occupied structures confines it to those intrusions that are typically the most alarming and danger-ous_” Id. at 71-72. [Emphasis added.]
The Model Penal Code provides the legislative history for our statute. Somewhere in the transposition, the drafters of our Penal Code changed the phraseology from “building and other occupied structures” to “ ‘Building,’ in addition to its ordinary meaning, means any structure,” etc. Perhaps this was to narrow the scope of Burglary I to inhabited premises rather than just premises “usually occupied by a person lodging therein,” as required in the definition of a “dwelling.” KRS 511.010(2). The Majority Opinion turns this around to *486the opposite conclusion, making the act of breaking into an uninhabited building a more serious offense than breaking into a dwelling.
The rule of “lenity” is a rule of statutory construction that applies to the interpretation of penal statutes; if the statute is ambiguous, a criminal is entitled to the more lenient construction. Boulder v. Commonwealth, Ky., 610 S.W.2d 615 (1980). As stated in Stoker v. Commonwealth, Ky., 828 S.W.2d 619, 627 (1992), the “rule of lenity [still] applies in interpreting criminal statutes.” The Majority decision in this case, which classifies unlawful entry into an abandoned, uninhabited and condemned building as Burglary I whereas it could not qualify as Burglary II, is an obvious violation of the rule of lenity.
It may well be that the appellant is guilty of having committed a terrible, outrageous crime against this unfortunate victim, Jennifer lies. Indeed, if the jury was convinced that he was responsible for this child’s death, it is difficult to understand why the appellant was convicted of involuntary manslaughter rather than wanton murder. But the seriousness of the homicide offense is no basis for piling on a conviction for first-degree burglary. The appellant’s Motion to Dismiss this charge should have been sustained.
STEPHENS, C.J., and COMBS, J., join.

. “(a) Is armed with explosives or a deadly weapon; or (b) Causes physical injury to any person who is not a participant in the crime; or (c) Uses or threatens the use of a dangerous instrument against any person who is not a participant in the crime.”