Defendant was charged in a two-count complaint, along with several coemployees, with violating Penal Code
The voluminous arrest report prepared by sheriffs’ deputies reveals the facts of this case. Briefly summarized, defendant was a waitress and dancer in a beer bar. While she was clothed when serving beer, she was observed to undress and perform naked on a raised platform located along one wall of the barroom. She openly displayed her private parts to the nearby customers, paying most of her attention to those customers who placed money on the platform for defendant.
Section 314 provides that “[e]very person who willfully and lewdly, either: [¶] 1. Exposes his person, or the private parts thereof, in any public place, or in any place where there are present other persons to be offended or annoyed thereby. . .[¶] .. .is guilty of a misdemeanor.”
Defendant’s first ground of appeal is that section 314 requires a sexual purpose including sexual arousal and that such arousal is of the defendant, not other persons. It was defendant’s contention in her pretrial motion that her purpose was to obtain money, not her own sexual arousal, and thus the potential jury should be so instructed in the words of CALJIC No. 16.220.
Pryor v. Municipal Court (1979)
“The final step is to define specifically the sexually motivated conduct proscribed by the section. (Cf. Miller v. California, supra,413 U.S. 15 , 24-26 [37 L.Ed.2d 419 , 430-432].) We proceed by deriving the function of this section in the penal statutes pertaining to sexual conduct. Section 647, subdivision (a), unlike statutes which ban sexual assault or exploitation of minors, is limited to conduct in public view. The statute thus serves the primary purpose of protecting onlookers who might be offended by the proscribed conduct.
“Two other statutes partially serve that same purpose. Penal Code section 314, subdivision 1, prohibits indecent exposure ‘in any public place, or in any place where there are present other persons to be offended or annoyed thereby. .. .’ Section 311.6 prohibits ‘obscene live conduct to or before an assembly or audience.. .in any public place or in any place exposed to public view, or in any place open to the public or to a segment thereof. . ..’ Neither statute, however, is directed at sexual conduct, as distinguished from indecent exposure, when such conduct is not intended to arouse the prurient interest of an audience. Section 647, subdivision (a), we believe, serves the function of filling*11 this gap in the penal law.” We read the above as indicating that section 314 is aimed at conduct intended to arouse an audience. People v. Swearington (1977)71 Cal.App.3d 935 [140 Cal.Rptr. 5 ], cited by defendant, does not conflict with this analysis. Swearington was a man who posed nude in public where women could see him. The Court of Appeal quotes CALJIC instruction No. 16.220 with approval but does not discuss the sexual purpose of Swearington’s posing. To the extent that Swearington can be read as requiring proof of intent of the defendant to arouse himself, it appears to be in conflict with Pryor v. Municipal Court, supra.
Defendant says that the trial court avoided the standards relating to obscenity prosecutions (§ 311 et seq.) by not limiting the question of sexual arousal to the actor alone. However, defendant places her reliance on In re Giannini (1968)
We note also that defendant has previously taken a position contrary to her present claim of First Amendment rights. Defendant and other employees of the beer bar obtained a writ of prohibition from the superior court restraining this prosecution in 1977. On appeal, the Court of Appeal reversed the judgment granting the peremptory writ. (Austin v. Municipal Court (1979)
The thrust of defendant’s second pretrial motion was that section 311.6 is a specific law that precludes application of the more general law of section 314. Section 311.6 reads as follows: “Every person who knowingly engages or participates in, manages, produces, sponsors, presents or exhibits obscene live conduct to or before an assembly or audience consisting of at least one person or spectator in any public place or in any place exposed to public view, or in any place open to the public or to a segment thereof, whether or not an admission fee is charged, or whether or not attendance is conditioned upon the presentation of a membership card or other token, is guilty of a misdemeanor.” In re Williamson (1954)
In applying these principles to the facts of our case, we are guided, once again, by Pryor v. Municipal Court, supra. As has been seen in the passage quoted above, the Supreme Court finds sections 647, subdi
The judgment is affirmed.
Cole, P. J., and Dowds, J., concurred.
A petition for a rehearing was denied January 16, 1980.
All further references to section 314, subdivision 1 will be made by reference solely to section 314. Defendant, unlike one codefendant, was not charged with violating subdivision 2 of section 314.
CALJIC 16.220 reads as follows: “Every person who intentionally exposes his private parts, in any public place, or in any place where there are present other persons who may be offended or annoyed thereby, if such exposure is made with the specific intent to direct public attention to his genitals for the purpose of his sexual arousal or gratification or to affront others, is guilty of a misdemeanor.”
