Court Opinion

ID: 9570877
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 20:27:15.268475+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:19:52.902953
License: Public Domain

TOAL, Chief Justice,
concurring in result only.
While I concur with the majority’s decision to affirm Wright’s CDVHAN conviction, I disagree with the majority’s conclusion that the “difference in the sexes” aggravating circumstance does not violate equal protection. I believe the “difference in the sexes” aggravating circumstance, as a gen*316der-based classification, violates equal protection. However, the violation is harmless in this instance because the jury found another aggravating circumstance, infliction of serious bodily injury, which does not violate equal protection.
I agree with the majority that the “difference in the sexes” aggravator is inherently gender-based, but would find that it does not satisfy the second prong of the analysis employed by the majority. As explained by the majority, to pass constitutional muster, a gender-based classification must (1) serve an important governmental objective and (2) be substantially related to the achievement of that objective. Craig v. Boren; Griffin v. Warden. The burden rests on the state to make this showing. Although the “difference in the sexes” classification is presumably intended to serve the governmental objective of preventing domestic violence, I would find it is not substantially related to achieving this objective.
The CDVHAN statute was designed to address violence in the home; it applies when any person harms any member of their household.3 The statute then is designed to prevent domestic violence against men, women, and children by perpetrators of both sexes. Having an aggravating circumstance based solely on gender does not substantially further this objective or the narrower objective of protecting women from domestic abuse. In my opinion, this gender-based classification is no different than the classification discussed by the majority and struck down by this Court in In the Interest of Joseph T. In that case, this Court held a statute criminalizing communication of indecent messages to females violated Equal Protection. Id. Although the Court recognized that some gender-based classifications which realistically reflect that men and women are not similarly situated can withstand equal protection scrutiny on occasion, it clarified that distinctions in the law which were based on “old notions” that women should be afforded “special protection” could no longer withstand equal protection scrutiny. Id.
*317In my opinion, this “difference in gender” aggravating circumstance is a distinction that perpetuates these “old notions.” There is no logical purpose for it except to protect physically inferior women from stronger men; a purpose based on out-dated generalizations of the sexes no longer favored in legal analysis. See United States v. Virginia, 518 U.S. 515, 116 S.Ct. 2264, 135 L.Ed.2d 735 (1996) (reiterating that gender classifications cannot be used as they once were to create or perpetuate the legal, social, and economic inferiority of women and cautioning reviewing courts to take a hard look at generalizations or tendencies of the sexes). Similarly, the cases relied upon by the majority are based on out-dated generalizations of the sexes no longer favored. The equal protection analysis set forth by the majority relies almost entirely on the 1979 North Carolina Supreme Court opinion State v. Gurganus, 39 N.C.App. 395, 250 S.E.2d 668 (1979). No court, federal or state, has ever relied on the analysis the majority cites from Gurganaus. In fact, Gurganus has been cited only once by any court, and then only for a rule of statutory interpretation in a case that did not involve equal protection issues. Guilford County Bd. of Educ. v. Guilford County Bd. of Elections, 110 N.C.App. 506, 430 S.E.2d 681 (1993).
Deterring domestic violence is more efficiently and appropriately accomplished through other aggravators, such as the “great disparity in ages or physical conditions of the parties” and “infliction of serious bodily injury” aggravators. In many cases, there may be a great disparity in strength between a male and a female, but if there is not, there is no reason why a difference in gender should serve as an aggravating circumstance to “protect” women to the detriment of men. Therefore, I would find that the “difference in the sexes” aggravating circumstance violates equal protection because it fails to substantially relate to the government objective of preventing domestic violence. However, I would affirm Wright’s conviction because the jury also found a permissible, gender-neutral aggravating circumstance: infliction of serious bodily injury.
Accordingly, I respectfully concur in result only.
PLEICONES, J., concurs.

. Household member includes spouses, former spouses, parents and children, relatives to the second degree, persons with a child in common, and males and females who are cohabiting or previously cohabited. S.C.Code Ann. § 16-25-10 (Supp.2001).