Opinion
B228172
01-03-2012
In re R.N., a Person Coming Under the Juvenile Court Law. THE PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. R.N., Defendant and Appellant.
James M. Crawford, under appointment by the Court of Appeal, for Defendant and Appellant. Kamala D. Harris, Attorney General, Dane R. Gillette, Chief Assistant Attorney General, Pamela C. Hamanaka, Assistant Attorney General, Blyth J. Leszkay and Taylor Nguyen, Deputy Attorneys General, for Plaintiff and Respondent.
NOT TO BE PUBLISHED IN THE OFFICIAL REPORTS
California Rules of Court, rule 8.1115(a), prohibits courts and parties from citing or relying on opinions not certified for publication or ordered published, except as specified by rule 8.1115(b). This opinion has not been certified for publication or ordered published for purposes of rule 8.1115.
(Los Angeles County Super. Ct. No. PJ45296)
APPEAL from an order of the Superior Court of Los Angeles County, Mark R. Frazin, Temporary Judge. (Pursuant to Cal. Const., art. VI, § 21.) Reversed.
James M. Crawford, under appointment by the Court of Appeal, for Defendant and Appellant.
Kamala D. Harris, Attorney General, Dane R. Gillette, Chief Assistant Attorney General, Pamela C. Hamanaka, Assistant Attorney General, Blyth J. Leszkay and Taylor Nguyen, Deputy Attorneys General, for Plaintiff and Respondent.
INTRODUCTION
Appellant R.N, a minor, appeals from the order of the juvenile court finding that he committed criminal trespass by "entering and occupying" mall property after being advised that he was barred from the premises. (Pen. Code, § 602, subd. (m).) Appellant asserts that respondent failed to present substantial evidence supporting a finding beyond a reasonable doubt that he "occupied" the mall property. We agree that there was not sufficient evidence to satisfy this element of the statute, and reverse the order of the juvenile court sustaining the petition under Welfare and Institutions Code section 602.
FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND
A petition filed by the Los Angeles County District Attorney's Office alleged appellant committed a misdemeanor offense of trespass at the Northridge Fashion Center. (Pen. Code, § 602, subd. (m).) At the adjudication hearing, Northridge Fashion Center security guard Malcolm Johnson testified that on May 22, 2009, he told appellant not to return to the mall property. Three days later, on May 25, 2009, security guards spotted appellant at the mall again; they detained him and served him with a written "notice to depart and forbid entry." On July 31, 2009, Johnson once again saw appellant on the exterior mall property. Appellant ran towards the movie theaters and down a corridor, where another security guard stopped him and took him into custody. Approximately five minutes passed from the time Johnson first spotted appellant to the time he was stopped by a security guard.
Johnson was the only witness to testify at the hearing. Following his testimony, appellant's counsel argued that the County had failed to prove that appellant "occupied" the mall property and thus failed to satisfy the elements of criminal trespass pursuant to subdivision (m) of Penal Code section 602 ("section 602"). The court rejected the argument, finding it significant that appellant had previous oral and written notice that he was barred from the property, and further finding that one occupies mall property by entering it for the purpose of shopping. The juvenile court sustained the petition and declared appellant a ward of the court. The court placed appellant on probation at home, with a six-month maximum term of confinement.
Appellant appeals from the juvenile court's order sustaining the petition.
DISCUSSION
"In assessing a claim of insufficiency of evidence, the reviewing court's task is to review the whole record in the light most favorable to the judgment to determine whether it discloses substantial evidence—that is, evidence that is reasonable, credible, and of solid value—such that a reasonable trier of fact could find the defendant guilty beyond a reasonable doubt." (People v. Rodriguez (1999) 20 Cal.4th 1, 11.) Reversal of a conviction for insufficient evidence "is unwarranted unless it appears 'that upon no hypothesis whatever is there sufficient substantial evidence to support [the conviction].' [Citation.]" (People v. Bolin (1998) 18 Cal.4th 297, 331.) These principles are equally applicable to a review on appeal of the sufficiency of the evidence in a juvenile proceeding in which the minor is alleged to have violated a criminal statute. (In re Roderick P. (1972) 7 Cal.3d 801, 809.)
Section 602, subdivision (m) provides that a person commits misdemeanor trespass by "[e]ntering and occupying real property or structures of any kind without the consent of the owner, the owner's agent, or the person in lawful possession." (§ 602, subd. (m).) Appellant contends that there was insufficient evidence that he "occupied" the mall property on July 31, 2009.
In People v. Wilkinson (1967) 248 Cal.App.2d Supp. 906, the Appellate Department of the Superior Court construed the meaning of the term "occupying" in section 602, subdivision (m). In that case, four defendants had camped overnight on private ranch property. There was no evidence that they intended to stay longer than one night; at the time they were arrested the following morning, they were packing up the campsite. (Id. at p. 908.) The defendants were convicted of trespass under section 602, subdivision (l), which was identical to the current subdivision (m). The court found that the meaning of the term "occupy" was evident from the "statement of urgency" accompanying the passage of Assembly Bill No. 1732 in 1945, which states as follows: "'This act is hereby declared to be an urgency measure. . . . A statement of the facts constituting such necessity is as follows: The tremendous increase in the population of this state in the last few years, resulting in a particularly heavy influx of people into the centers of defense industries and areas near military camps, has led to a serious housing shortage. In consequence, there has been an alarming increase in squatter occupancy of lands by lawless and irresponsible persons. This evil should be corrected at once. To enable the authorities to stamp out this epidemic, it is necessary that this act take immediate effect.'" (Wilkinson, supra, 248 Cal.App.2d Supp. at p. 910.)
In 2003, the Legislature amended section 602, resulting in a renumbering of subdivision (l) to subdivision (m). (Sen. Bill No. 993 (2003-2004 Reg. Sess.) ch. 805.)
The court held that the legislative history thus demonstrates that the Legislature "intended the word 'occupy' to mean a nontransient, continuous type of possession" with "some degree of dispossession and permanency." (Wilkinson, supra, 248 Cal.App.2d Supp. at pp. 910, 911.) Had the Legislature intended to prohibit mere transient possession of a property, it would have used a verb such as "be, remain, loiter, tarry, camp [or] stay" in lieu of "occupy." (Id. at p. 910.) The court thus concluded that "the transient overnight use of four 3 x 7 foot areas in a very large ranch for sleeping bags and campfire purposes was not the type of conduct which the Legislature intended to prevent when it used the word 'occupy.'" (Ibid.; see also CALJIC No. 16.340 [elements of trespass under subd. (m) include proving that defendant "occupies some portion or all thereof continuously or until ousted therefrom" and defendant "entered and occupied the property with the specific intent to dispossess those lawfully entitled to possession from that portion of the property actually occupied"].)
The California Supreme Court cited Wilkinson with approval in its decision In re Catalano (1981) 29 Cal.3d 1 (Catalano). In Catalano, the defendants, who were union representatives, entered a construction site where union workers were working in order to conduct a safety inspection and prepare a steward's report. After they had inspected several houses under construction, an agent of the property owner asked them to leave the property; the defendants replied that they would leave when they had finished their report. They completed the report, spoke for a few minutes to two workers, and then returned to their car to leave the property. The property owner blocked their exit and effected a citizen's arrest. (Id. at p. 5.)
The defendants were convicted under another subdivision of Penal Code section 602 - subdivision (k) - and thus the primary issue before the Supreme Court was whether conviction under that subdivision was proper. However, the court also briefly took up the question whether the defendants could have been charged under then-subdivision (l). The court noted that "[a] violation of this subdivision . . . requires occupation of the property, a 'nontransient, continuous type of possession.'" (Catalano, supra, 29 Cal.3d at p. 10, fn. 8, quoting Wilkinson, supra, 248 Cal.App.2d Supp. at p. 910.) The court found that the defendants' conduct did not constitute the sort of nontransient possession of the property that would constitute a trespass in violation of then-subdivision (1). (Ibid.)
Recently, the Ninth Circuit considered a 42 United States Code section 1983 claim against the City and County of San Francisco in which the plaintiff alleged, in part, that San Francisco police officers lacked probable cause to arrest him for trespassing on the property of a housing cooperative. (Edgerly v. City and County of San Francisco (9th Cir. 2010) 599 F.3d 946, 950.) In that case, two police officers, while on daytime patrol, observed the plaintiff standing inside the fence that surrounded the housing cooperative property, next to a playground area. Five minutes later, the police officers observed the plaintiff standing in the same location. (Id. at p. 952.) According to the officers, they knew that the plaintiff did not live at the cooperative and that he had previously been arrested for a drug offense at a nearby street corner. After questioning the plaintiff and determining that he had no specific reason to be there, the officers arrested him for trespassing in violation of section 602, subdivision (l) (now subd. (m)). (Ibid.) Relying on Catalano and Wilkinson, the Ninth Circuit held that no reasonable officer would have believed the plaintiff was "occupying" the cooperative property because they knew only that "he had been on the property for a matter of minutes." (Id. at p. 954.)
Like the alleged trespassers in Wilkinson, Catalano, and Edgerly, appellant made only transient use of the property on which he was alleged to be trespassing. Respondent demonstrated only that he was on mall property on July 31, 2009 for approximately five minutes, from the point that Johnson spied him on the exterior mall property to the time he was detained after he tried to run away. Such a fleeting appearance does not constitute "occupying" the mall property for purposes of section 602, subdivision (m).
However, respondent contends that "where there has been a prior entry restriction," the term "occupying" should include "a temporary, short-term entry onto property." We do not agree. The fact that appellant was previously barred from the property otherwise open to the public speaks to the lack of consent by the property owner to his presence, not to whether appellant was "occupying" the property. Moreover, the legislative history of section 602, subdivision (m), as discussed in Wilkinson, does not permit respondents' interpretation of the statute. It is clear that the provision was intended to criminalize occupancy of real property by squatters. (Wilkinson, supra, 248 Cal.App.2d Supp. at pp. 910-911.) While respondent suggests that the policy behind section 602, subdivision (m) has "little to no application in modern society" and argues that we should construe the provision to address the problems of today's property owners, we cannot ignore the legislative history describing its intended purpose and bend the statute to fit another purpose.
In sum, we conclude that respondent failed to present sufficient evidence to support a finding beyond a reasonable doubt that appellant violated section 602, subdivision (m). Because we reverse the order sustaining the petition under Welfare and Institutions Code section 602, we need not consider appellant's argument that the juvenile court erred by setting a maximum term of confinement.
DISPOSITION
The order of the juvenile court is reversed.
NOT TO BE PUBLISHED IN THE OFFICIAL REPORTS
WILLHITE, J.
We concur:
EPSTEIN, P. J.
MANELLA, J.