In Re Lovell

572 N.W.2d 44, 226 Mich. App. 84

• Court: Michigan Court of Appeals
• Decided: October 21, 1997
• Docket: Docket 194504
• Status: Published

Opinions

Bandstra, P.J.

Appellee, a sixteen-year-old minor, allegedly assaulted and battered her mother in the kitchen of their home. The prosecutor filed a petition charging appellee under MCL 750.81(2); MSA 28.276(2) with assault and battery. The referee hearing the case refused to issue the petition, concluding that the particular subsection under which appellee was charged did not apply to the facts of the present case. The prosecutor filed a “Request for Review of Referee Recommendation” in the probate court, which affirmed. The prosecutor appealed to the circuit court, which also affirmed. The prosecutor’s application for leave to appeal to this Court was granted. We reverse.

MCL 750.81; MSA 28.276, the assault and battery statute, was amended by 1994 PA 64¹ to provide increasing penalties for what is generally referred to as “domestic violence” or “domestic assault,” depending upon the number of prior convictions.² Appellee was charged under subsection 2, which provides in pertinent part that “an individual who assaults or assaults and batters his or her spouse or former spouse, an individual with whom he or she has had a child in common, or a resident or former resident of his or her household, is guilty of a misdemeanor . . . The parties effectively agree for purposes of this appeal that appellee’s alleged act, if proved, would constitute an assault and battery. In addition, there is no dispute that appellee and her mother lived together at the time of the events in question. The parties, of course, also agree that appellee is not the spouse or former spouse of the complainant, and equally obviously, there is no suggestion that appellee and the complainant somehow share parentage of a child. The issue in the present appeal concerns whether the phrase “a resident ... of his or her household” can encompass the type of relationship involved in this case, the parent-child relationship.

The prosecutor suggests that the three categories set forth in the statute — spouses and former spouses, common parents, and residents of the offender’s household — each represent a distinct classification of individuals to whom the statute applies. To paraphrase the prosecutor’s argument, if any one of these classifications encompasses the alleged victim, the statute applies. We agree with the prosecutor’s analysis and conclude that, as its clear language states, the statute applies to “an individual who assaults or assaults and batters ... a resident or former resident of his or her household . . . .” When a statute is clear and unambiguous, judicial interpretation is precluded. Lorencz v Ford Motor Co, 439 Mich 370, 376; 483 NW2d 844 (1992). Courts may not speculate regarding the probable intent of the Legislature beyond the words expressed in the statute. In re Schnell, 214 Mich App 304, 310; 543 NW2d 11 (1995). Thus, we must reject our dissenting colleague’s creative efforts at divining some different legislative intent behind the statute; the words of the statute speak for themselves.³

The three categories of victims set forth in the statute are discrete classifications, and if a victim falls within one of these classifications, the statute applies. Coverage extends, in the first category, to offenders who presently or previously were married to the victim or, in the second category, to offenders who biologically parented a child with the victim. Either of these categories may apply regardless of whether the offender and victim ever resided together in the same household. The third category applies to offenders who resided in a household with the victim at or before the time of the assault (or assault and battery) regardless of the victim’s relationship with the offender. The statute thus applies to “domestic” offenders broadly defined as including persons joined by marriage, common parenting, or common household residence with the victim.⁴

We reverse.

Griffin, J., concurred.

1 Effective July 1, 1994.

2 Before the amendment, MCL 750.81; MSA 28.276 simply provided:

Any person who shall be convicted of an assault or an assault and battery where no other punishment is prescribed shall be guilty of a misdemeanor.

This provision, with amendments, is now subsection 1 of the statute; subsections 2 through 4 of the current statute apply to initial and subsequent convictions of domestic assault. We fail to discern the logic of our dissenting colleague’s argument that the language of subsection 1, applicable only to general assault and battery, might “bolster” any interpretation of the language of subsections 2 through 4 dealing with domestic assault and battery.

3 Beyond this general reason for rejecting our dissenting colleague’s analysis, we have other specific concerns with the approach taken. The dissent argues that the term “domestic” introduces some ambiguity into the statute, but this term appears only in the catchline heading of the section in the Michigan Compiled Laws Annotated; it is not part of the section and cannot be used to construe the section. MCL 8.4b; MSA 2.215; People v Nick, 374 Mich 664, 665; 133 NW2d 201 (1965). Also, the construction offered by the dissent, requiring “romantic involvement” between the offender and the victim, seems especially problematic because it would narrow the statute to exclude, for example, most assaults upon children by adults in the same household.

4 We specifically reject the dissent’s suggestion that, under our analysis, college roommates would, like the family members here, be considered common residents of a household for purposes of this statute. That issue is not before us, and we offer no opinion on it.