Court Opinion

ID: 9406156
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-06-30 05:05:30.875364+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:20:27.486797
License: Public Domain

If this opinion indicates that it is “FOR PUBLICATION,” it is subject to
                 revision until final publication in the Michigan Appeals Reports.

                          STATE OF MICHIGAN

                           COURT OF APPEALS

PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF MICHIGAN,                                    UNPUBLISHED
                                                                    June 29, 2023
               Plaintiff-Appellant,

v                                                                   No. 363138
                                                                    Oakland Circuit Court
COURTNEY MARIE DANIELS,                                             LC No. 2022-193360-AR

               Defendant-Appellee.

Before: HOOD, P.J., and SHAPIRO and YATES, JJ.

PER CURIAM.

        While Jacob Amick was facing charges of criminal sexual conduct (CSC) for acts allegedly
committed against AT, the 12-year-old daughter of defendant, Courtney Marie Daniels, defendant
made a video call to her mother and AT before AT gave testimony against Amick at his preliminary
examination. In that call, defendant instructed her mother not to take AT to testify against Amick,
called AT a “lying bitch” because the sexual acts with Amick never happened, and threatened that
her mother and AT would never see defendant’s three-year-old son if AT testified against Amick.
The evidence established that defendant made that video call from a location in Wayne County to
her mother and AT, who received that call in Wayne County. But because Amick’s criminal case
was occurring in Oakland County, the Oakland County prosecutor’s office charged defendant with
witness intimidation under MCL 750.122(6) in Oakland County. The district court dismissed that
charge based on improper venue, so the Oakland County prosecutor filed an appeal to the Oakland
County Circuit Court, which affirmed the dismissal for want of proper venue in Oakland County.
We thereafter granted leave to appeal,1 and we now vacate the circuit court’s order and remand for
further proceedings against defendant in Oakland County on the witness-intimidation charge.

1
  People v Daniels, unpublished order of the Court of Appeals, entered November 23, 2022
(Docket No. 363138).

                                               -1-
                                 I. FACTUAL BACKGROUND

         The basic facts are not in dispute. Jacob Amick was charged in Oakland County with CSC
for acts allegedly committed against AT, who is defendant’s daughter. On September 1, 2021, on
the eve of Amick’s preliminary examination, defendant made a video call to her mother, who was
in Taylor, Michigan, with AT at the time of the call. Defendant berated her mother during the call,
yelling that her mother “did not need to bring [AT] to the court date,” telling her mother that if she
“showed up to court” she would “never see her grandson again[,]” calling AT “a lying bitch,” and
stating that the alleged CSC perpetrated by Amick “never happened.” In spite of that threatening
call, defendant’s mother drove AT to the courthouse to testify at Amick’s preliminary examination.
AT subsequently confirmed under oath that she took part in the video call on September 1, 2021,
when defendant called. During that call, AT heard defendant say that AT should “not go to court”
and that the acts of CSC “never happened.” AT also heard defendant refer to her little brother and
instruct AT and her grandmother to “say [y]our last goodbyes because you’re not going to be able
to see him anymore or talk to him.”

        In the wake of the video call, the Oakland County prosecutor’s office filed a complaint that
charged defendant with witness intimidation under MCL 750.122(6). The prosecution conceded
that the video call was initiated and received in Wayne County, but nonetheless asserted that venue
was proper in Oakland County because the threats defendant made and the instructions defendant
gave to her mother and AT on that call were intended to have an effect in Oakland County, where
Amick’s preliminary examination was scheduled to take place. The district court disagreed and
dismissed the charge against defendant without prejudice based on improper venue.

         The prosecution appealed the dismissal to the Oakland County Circuit Court, which issued
a written opinion on September 14, 2022, affirming the district court’s dismissal without prejudice.
The circuit court noted that “cell phone records confirmed that Defendant was in Wayne County
at all times during the subject video call” and defendant’s mother was also in Wayne County when
she received the call. The circuit court considered MCL 762.8, which prescribes venue in criminal
cases involving “2 or more acts done in the perpetration of [a] felony[,]” and concluded that venue
was improper in Oakland County under that statute. The prosecution then sought leave to appeal
to this Court, which we granted. See People v Daniels, unpublished order of the Court of Appeals,
entered November 23, 2022 (Docket No. 363138). As a result, we must now consider whether the
witness-intimidation charge against defendant can proceed in Oakland County.

                                      II. LEGAL ANALYSIS

        The district court and the circuit court both rejected the prosecution’s argument that venue
for the witness-intimidation charge is proper in Oakland County under MCL 762.8, which states:

               Whenever a felony consists or is the culmination of 2 or more acts done in
       the perpetration of that felony, the felony may be prosecuted in any county where
       any of those acts were committed or in any county that the defendant intended the
       felony or acts done in perpetration of the felony to have an effect.

The two lower courts’ “determination regarding the existence of venue in a criminal prosecution
is reviewed de novo.” People v Houthoofd, 487 Mich 568, 579; 790 NW2d 315 (2010). This case

                                                 -2-
involves MCL 762.8, “the interpretation of which we also review de novo.” People v McBurrows,
504 Mich 308, 313; 934 NW2d 748 (2019). “The determination of venue is a question of fact for
the jury,” People v Gayheart, 285 Mich App 202, 226; 776 NW2d 330 (2009), so the prosecution
must offer evidence at the preliminary examination sufficient to establish probable cause of proper
venue. See People v White, 509 Mich 96, 104; 983 NW2d 348 (2022).

        As a general rule, a criminal prosecution must take place in the county in which the crime
was committed. McBurrows, 504 Mich at 313. There “are certain exceptions to or expansions of
the ‘general rule’ ” that permit “venue in locations besides the location provided for in the ‘general
rule.’ ” Id. One expansion is MCL 762.8, see id. at 326-327, which affords venue in a county in
which no criminal acts occurred. But reliance on MCL 762.8 as the justification for venue depends
on satisfaction of two separate requirements. First, the prosecution must establish that the charged
“felony consists or is the culmination of 2 or more acts done in the perpetration of that felony[.]”
MCL 762.8. Second, the prosecution must show that “the defendant intended the felony or acts
done in perpetration of the felony to have an effect” in the county where venue is asserted. Id. If
both requirements are met, venue is proper in the county where the defendant intended the felony
or acts done in perpetration of the felony to have an effect. People v Boshell, 337 Mich App 322,
340; 975 NW2d 72 (2021). Here, the competing parties appear to agree—and for good reason—
that defendant intended her acts to have an effect in Oakland County, where Amick’s preliminary
examination was scheduled to take place. Therefore, the outcome of this appeal turns on whether
two or more acts comprised defendant’s perpetration of the felony of witness intimidation.

        Under MCL 762.8, “it is not necessary that the act constitute an essential element of [the]
offense.” People v Meredith (On Remand), 209 Mich App 403, 409; 531 NW2d 749 (1995). Here,
the prosecution argues that the charged witness-intimidation felony comprised at least two separate
acts. We agree. The statute proscribing witness intimidation, MCL 750.122(6), states:

              A person shall not willfully impede, interfere with, prevent, or obstruct or
       attempt to willfully impede, interfere with, prevent, or obstruct the ability of a
       witness to attend, testify, or provide information in or for a present or future official
       proceeding.

Faithful application of that statutory language to the facts in this case reveals that defendant’s one
video call comprised at least two separate acts proscribed under MCL 750.122(6). First, defendant
attempted to impede the ability of AT to attend Amick’s preliminary examination by persuading
her mother (who was AT’s grandmother and AT’s source of transportation) not to drive AT to the
court where the preliminary examination was scheduled to occur. Second, defendant attempted to
interfere with the ability of AT herself to testify by threatening to cut off contact between AT and
her little brother if AT testified against Amick. Those two acts by defendant, taken together, satisfy
the requirement in MCL 750.122(6) of “2 or more acts done in the perpetration of th[e] felony[.]”

         In concluding that defendant’s single video call involved two separate acts, we reject the
circuit court’s position that “[i]dentifying portions of one video call—one conversation—does not
create separate, distinguishable acts.” If defendant had spoken only with her mother or AT during
that one video call, the circuit court’s approach might be sustainable. But defendant directed some
comments exclusively to her mother and other comments to AT as well, thereby instilling concern
in the witness herself, i.e., AT, and the witness’s transportation to court, i.e., defendant’s mother.

                                                 -3-
        Defendant insists that she spoke only to her mother, and never to AT, but the record belies
that contention. When AT testified at defendant’s preliminary examination on November, 8, 2021,
she offered the following comments about her participation in the video call made by defendant:

               Q. So, on the morning of September 1st, did you talk to your mom?

               A. Yes.

               Q. How did you talk to your mom?

               A. She was on the phone with my grandma.

               Q. And where did this occur?

               A. She–

               Q. Where were you when–

               A.–was in the same room. We were at my aunt and my uncle’s house, and
       I was in the kitchen and my grandma was in the kitchen on the phone with my mom.

               Q. Okay. And what did you hear your mom say?

               A. That to not go to court, that she doesn’t want me to go through all this
       and just tell the truth, don’t lie, that this never happened.

               Q. Okay. And what else did she say?

               A. She said–she showed my mom and–she showed my brother and then she
       said that to say our last goodbyes because you’re not going to be able to see him
       anymore or talk to him. [Emphasis added.]

Defendant’s instruction to her mother and AT to “say our last goodbyes” leaves no doubt that that
comment was directed at AT. When AT was subsequently asked how defendant’s comment about
her brother made her feel, AT responded: “Sad and worried. Worried because of me not being
able to see my brother again and me thinking she’s going to be serious about that.” Consequently,
defendant’s insistence that none of her comments were aimed at AT is untenable. As a result, we
conclude that defendant committed two acts in her video call, thereby supporting venue in Oakland
County under MCL 762.8 for the charge of witness intimidation under MCL 750.122(6). For that
reason, we must reverse the decisions of the lower courts and remand the criminal case for further
proceedings in Oakland County.

       Reversed and remanded for further proceedings. We do not retain jurisdiction.

                                                            /s/ Noah P. Hood
                                                            /s/ Douglas B. Shapiro
                                                            /s/ Christopher P. Yates

                                                -4-