Court Opinion

ID: 9558664
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 17:15:05.655088+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:09:30.557457
License: Public Domain

Chief Justice MULLARKEY
concurring in part and dissenting in part:
I respectfully dissent from the majority’s holding in part II.B(3) that the phrase “act of harassment” in section 18-8-706, 6 C.R.S. (1999), is unconstitutionally overbroad. In my opinion, proper statutory construction and a considered application of the over-breadth doctrine would permit this court to uphold the constitutionality of section 18-8-706 in its entirety.
I.
This case calls upon us to determine whether the phrase “threat, act of harassment, or act of harm or injury” in section 18-8-706 renders the statute unconstitutionally overbroad. While I agree with the majority’s holding that the term “threat,” when properly construed, does not render section 18-8-706 unconstitutionally overbroad, I write separately to explain more fully my reasons for joining that part of the majority’s opinion.
Witnesses are indispensable participants in our criminal justice system. The Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution provides a criminal defendant the rights “to be confronted with the witnesses against him” and “to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor.” U.S. Const, amend. Y. Without witnesses who are willing to report crimes and testify against defendants, the state cannot enforce its criminal laws constitutionally. The state therefore has an interest of the highest order in ensuring that witnesses will continue to report crimes and will be willing and able to testify either on behalf of or against criminal defendants.
The statute challenged here has been enacted not merely to preserve the safety of witnesses and victims, but to protect the administration of criminal justice against those who would use improper means to influence witnesses or prevent them from testifying. Properly construed, the term “threat” in section 18-8-706 is narrowly tailored to achieve the state’s interest in preserving a climate where witnesses and victims report crimes and testify. Consequently, it targets speech that the government may regulate in accordance with the First Amendment.
Having reached this conclusion, I further find that the term “threat” in section 18-8-706 does not render the statute unconstitutionally overbroad merely because it conceivably applies to some protected speech. The amount of constitutionally protected speech that might be chilled by the legislature’s use of the term “threat” surely is de minimis in relation to the statute’s plainly legitimate sweep. Therefore, the defendant’s over-breadth challenge to the term “threat” must fail.
II.
The majority concludes that the phrase “act of harassment” renders section 18-8-706 *647unconstitutionally overbroad. See maj. op. at 641-43. I cannot agree. As I explain in .the pages that follow, the majority unnecessarily ignores a constitutional construction of “act of harassment” found in the Colorado Criminal Code and instead adopts a plainly over-broad construction that does not fit within the context of section 18-8-706.
After consulting Webster’s Third New International Dictionary 1031 (1986), the majority states that “act of harassment” in the context of the statute means to “vex, trouble, or annoy.” See maj. op. at 642. Based on its assessment that certain constitutionally protected activities might vex, trouble, or annoy a victim or witness — the majority provides as examples ordering a labor strike in retaliation against a falsely testifying manager and informing a witness of an intent to report perjury — the court strikes “act of harassment” from the statute.
Under a context-sensitive reading of the statute, however, “act of harassment” should not be understood as an action that merely vexes, troubles, or annoys a witness or victim, and the majority errs when it substitutes these words for the actual text of the statute. Rather, the type of action denoted by “act of harassment” must be determined from its immediate context, “threat, act of harassment, or act of harm or injury,” as well as its place in the broader context of a statute designed to encourage witnesses to report crimes and testify unreservedly. When viewed in these contexts, “act of harassment” should not be construed to mean behavior that merely vexes, troubles, or annoys. To the contrary, the phrase should be understood to connote actions of the same character as threats and acts that cause injury or harm.
The majority also offers an alternative, legal definition of “harassment”: “Words, conduct or action (usu. repeated or persistent) that, being directed at a specific person, annoys, alarms, or causes substantial emotional distress in that person and serves no legitimate purpose.” Black’s Laiv Dictionary 721 (7th ed.1999) (cited in maj. op. at 642). This definition offers a better understanding of what “act of harassment” means in the context of section 18-8-706. Yet even this definition cannot simply be substituted for the word “harassment” in the statute. The definition in Black’s indicates that “harassment” can have a range of meanings, from words, conduct, or action that “annoys” to words, conduct, or action that “causes substantial emotional distress ... and serves no legitimate purpose.” This range of meanings raises an ambiguity in the statutory language. Consequently, we must use other methods of statutory construction to interpret “act of harassment.”
The majority interprets “threat” to mean “an expression of intent to commit harm or injury to another’s person, property, or rights through the commission of an unlawful act.” Maj. op. at 639. A reasonable interpretation of “act of harassment” should, therefore, refer to subject matter similar to what is meant by “threat” and “act of harm or injury.” Cf. Sheely v. People, 54 Colo. 136, 138, 129 P. 201, 202 (1912).
One interpretation of “act of harassment” that is consistent with “threat” and “act of harm or injury” can be found in section 18-9-111(1), 6 C.R.S. (1999). In section 18-9-111(1), the legislature codified the crime of “harassment.”
A person commits harassment if, with intent to harass, annoy, or alarm another person, he or she:
(a) Strikes, shoves, kicks, or otherwise touches a person or subjects him to physical contact; or
(b) In a public place directs obscene language or makes an obscene gesture to or at another person; or
(c) Follows a person in or about a public place; or
(d) Repealed.
(e) Initiates communication with a person, anonymously or otherwise by telephone, in a manner intended to harass or threaten bodily injury or property damage, or makes any comment, request, suggestion, or proposal by telephone which is obscene; or
(f) Makes a telephone call or causes a telephone to ring repeatedly, whether or not a conversation ensues, with no purpose of legitimate conversation; or
(g) Makes repeated communications at inconvenient hours that invade the privacy of another and interfere in the use and enjoyment of another’s home or private residence or other private property; or
*648(h) Repeatedly insults, taunts, challenges, or makes communications in offensively coarse language to, another in a manner likely to provoke a violent or disorderly response.
§ 18-9-111(1). The harassment statute clearly targets actions that are in the same league as “threats” and “acts of harm or injury.” Moreover, this statute is narrowly drafted to proscribe speech that the government legitimately may regulate under well-recognized exceptions to the First Amendment’s prohibition against laws regulating speech. See R.A.V. v. City of St. Paul, 505 U.S. 377, 383, 112 S.Ct. 2538, 120 L.Ed.2d 305 (1992) (noting that the government may regulate fighting words and obscenity consistently with the First Amendment); see also Whimbush v. People, 869 P.2d 1245, 1248 (Colo.1994) (acknowledging the state’s power to proscribe fighting words likely to provoke immediate violence).
In my opinion, construing “act of harassment” in section 18-8-706 to mean the crime of harassment defined in section 18-9-111(1) would give effect to the legislature’s intent. See § 2-4-201, 1 C.R.S. (1999). This interpretation would comply with the constitutions of the State of Colorado and the United States, would render section 18-8-706 effective in its entirety, and would produce a just and reasonable result feasible of execution. See §§ 2-4-201(a) to (d). Under this view, the crime of harassment, which is ordinarily a class 3 misdemeanor, would be enhanced to a class 3 felony so long as the other elements of section 18-8-706 were met. Compare § 18-9-111(2) with § 18-8-706(2). Thus, the commission of harassment against a witness or victim in retaliation or retribution for the witness or victim’s role in a criminal prosecution would constitute offenses under either section 18-9-111(1) as ordinary harassment or section 18-8-706 as retaliation against a witness or victim.
Given this understanding of “act of harassment,” the phrase does not proscribe protected forms of speech and expression. The examples offered by the majority — ordering a strike and threatening to report perjury— would not be actionable as “acts of harassment” under section 18-8-706, because they would not constitute the crime of harassment under section 18-9-111(1).
III.
The overbreadth doctrine should be used to strike a statute only as a last resort, where the party challenging the statute proves beyond a reasonable doubt that the statute admits no reasonable constitutional interpretation. Here, we reasonably can interpret “act of harassment” to mean the crime of harassment defined in section 18-9-111(1). Unlike the majority’s interpretation of “act of harassment,” my interpretation would render the entirety of section 18-8-706 constitutional under the overbreadth doctrine. I therefore respectfully dissent from that part of the majority’s opinion holding “act of harassment” unconstitutional.
Justice HOBBS and Justice RICE join in this concurrence and dissent.