The contours of the crime of threat to commit a crime are explored in Commonwealth v. Leonardo L. (a juvenile) (Massachusetts Appeals Court No. 20-P-645, August 4, 2021).
In Leonardo, the thirteen-year-old defendant, during a meeting with a school vice principal, stated of one of his teachers, while agitated and in a loud voice: “The teacher makes me so angry! I want to kill that b**ch.” Leonardo was known generally to be quick to anger and difficult to diffuse. The teacher was fearful of Leonardo. Based upon the statement, Leonardo’s character, and the teacher’s apprehension, the authorities charged Leonardo with threat to commit a crime. The Appeals Court considered whether the allegations were sufficient to amount to threat to commit a crime.
Note that the “threat” was a statement of desire rather than of intended future action (“I want to . . .”); the “threat” was not made to the intended target; and there was no suggestion that Leonardo was prepared actually to commit or attempt murder.
The Appeals Court explained: A criminal threat occurs “[one,] when someone expresses an intention to inflict a crime on another, [two,] has the ability to carry out that crime, [three,] causes the victim to fear harm, and [four,] does so in circumstances that make the victim’s fear justifiable . . . In analyzing [whether a statement is a] threat, [a court] . . . consider[s] the entire context in which a statement is made, including the [speaker’s] actions and demeanor at the time, and prior communications between the [speaker] and the recipient.”
Intent: The court concluded that Leonardo did express an intent to inflict a crime upon his teacher: He was angry when he uttered words of harm and expected the assistant principal to communicate his words to the teacher.
Ability: The court concluded that the teacher’s apprehension was sufficient to establish that Leonardo was with the ability to at least attempt to carry out the crime of murder.
Fear of Harm: Here, the court explained that all that was required was the teacher’s actual apprehension that Leonardo might cause or attempt to cause her harm.
Fear is Justifiable: Here, the court explained that justifiable fear is fear that the speaker may attempt to commit the threatened crime, not necessarily fear that the crime will be accomplished. Here too, the teacher’s actual apprehension satisfied the requirement of justifiable fear.
It is interesting that the requirement that the government prove the speaker possesses “the ability to carry out th[e] crime,” seems to be a given--since murder can be accomplished in any number of ways, this element seemingly would be meaningful only if the speaker made a statement of the impossible (e.g., “I will kill you yesterday” or “I will kill you when we meet on Mars.”).
The Moral of the Story: Be very careful of what you say when you’re angry.
image courtesy: wayhomestudio www.freepik.com
