Court Opinion

ID: 9603345
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 02:05:13.284906+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:02:10.892856
License: Public Domain

Utter, J.
(concurring) — I disagree with the majority's interpretation of the United States Supreme Court's decisions as precluding challenges to criminal statutes as facially vague unless they involve First Amendment freedoms and with its determination that the language of RCW 9A.40.010(1) is not vague. However, I concur in the result reached by the majority.
Because this court is considering Worrell's challenge only under the fourteenth amendment to the United States Constitution, footnote 1, we are hound by the United States Supreme Court's holdings regarding when a statute may be challenged as facially vague. The Court's latest statement *546on this issue is Kolender v. Lawson, 461 U.S. 352, 75 L. Ed. 2d 903, 103 S. Ct. 1855 (1983), the relevant portions of which merit quotation:
In his dissent, Justice White claims that " [t]he upshot of our cases ... is that whether or not a statute purports to regulate constitutionally protected conduct, it should not be held unconstitutionally vague on its face unless it is vague in all of its possible applications." . . . The description of our holdings is inaccurate in several respects. First, it neglects the fact that we permit a facial challenge if a law reaches "a substantial amount of constitutionally protected conduct." Hoffman Estates v. Flipside, Hoffman Estates, Inc., 455 U. S. 489, 494 (1982). Second, where a statute imposes criminal penalties, the standard of certainty is higher. See Winters v. New York, 333 U. S. 507, 515 (1948). This concern has, at times, led us to invalidate a criminal statute on its face even when it could conceivably have had some valid application. See, e. g., Colautti v. Franklin, 439 U. S. 379, 394-401 (1979); Lanzetta v. New Jersey, 306 U. S. 451 (1939). . . .
No authority cited by the dissent supports its argument about facial challenges in the arbitrary enforcement context. . . .
Kolender, at 358 n.8.
Contrary to the Court's statement in United States v. Mazurie, 419 U.S. 544, 550, 42 L. Ed. 2d 706, 95 S. Ct. 710 (1975), quoted by the majority, at 541, it now appears that facial challenges to criminal statutes are allowed in specific types of criminal cases other than First Amendment cases. As the Court noted in Colautti v. Franklin, 439 U.S. 379, 395, 58 L. Ed. 2d 596, 99 S. Ct. 675 (1979), cited in Kolen-der, at 358 n.8: "This Court has long recognized that the constitutionality of a vague statutory standard is closely related to whether that standard incorporates a requirement of mens rea.” In Colautti, the Court found unconstitutionally vague on its face a statute subjecting physicians to criminal liability without regard to fault for failing to abide by a standard of care where a fetus "may be viable". In Lanzetta v. New Jersey, 306 U.S. 451, 83 L. Ed. 888, 59 *547S. Ct. 618 (1939), cited in Kolender, at 358 n.8, the Court found unconstitutionally vague on its face a statute criminalizing membership in a "gang". Finally, in Kolender, the Court found unconstitutionally vague on its face a statute that required an individual to provide "credible and reliable" identification when requested by a police officer with reasonable suspicion of criminal activity.
Although the Court has not spelled out exactly when it will consider facial challenges that do not involve First Amendment or other fundamental rights, from Kolender and the cases cited therein we may infer that such challenges will be considered if: (1) the statute criminalizes behavior that would not normally be considered criminal with no requirement of mens rea (Kolender; Colautti); (2) the statute invites an inordinate amount of police discretion, to the point of allowing police to selectively enforce the statute at their "whim" (Kolender); or (3) the statute's vagueness is truly egregious (Lanzetta).
The statute at issue in this case, RCW 9A.40.020, does not implicate any of the foregoing concerns, nor does it tend to chill rights protected by the First Amendment. I therefore agree with the majority that we not consider a challenge to the statute as unconstitutionally vague on its face under the Fourteenth Amendment. Worrell does not challenge the statute's vagueness as it applies to the facts of his case.
Having concluded that there may be no facial challenge to RCW 9A.40.010, the majority's discussion as to the vagueness of the words "without legal authority" in that statute is unnecessary, and in my opinion erroneous. I have previously excepted to this court's apparent reversal of a line of cases that, until recently, consistently found unconstitutionally vague language such as the "legal authority" language of RCW 9A.40.010(1) with no guidance in a statute or the common law on the meaning of that term. See State v. Smith, 111 Wn.2d 1, 16, 759 P.2d 372 (1988) (Utter, J., dissenting); State v. Aver, 109 Wn.2d 303, 312, 745 P.2d 479 (1987) (Utter, J., dissenting). For the reasons *548I stated in those cases, and because a resolution of that issue is not necessary to the disposition of this case, I concur in the majority's result, but not in all of its analysis.