Riley, J.
Appellant-Defendant, David A. Kifer (Kifer), appeals his conviction for criminal trespass, as a Level 6 felony, Ind. Code § 35-43-2-2(b)(1).
Kifer presents this court with two issues on appeal, one of which we find dispositive and which we restate as: Whether the State presented sufficient evidence beyond a reasonable doubt to support Kifer’s conviction for criminal trespass.
On March 1, 2005, David Rector (Rector), the general manager for the Evansville Vanderburgh County Building Authority (Building Authority), mailed a letter to Kifer, alerting him to “[p]lease be advised that you are no longer permitted to be in the Civic Center Complex. This action is required in order to protect the safety of those who visit and work in the Civic Center Complex.” The Civic Center Complex consists of three buildings and houses different government agencies, including the county courts, the police department, and the city and county administrative offices. On February 14, 2009, Kifer was sentenced in an unrelated case and the trial court, referencing the earlier ban, suggested that he contact the sheriff’s office several days in advance if he needed to enter the building. The sheriff’s office would then provide him with an escort to the specific office that he needed to visit.
On March 4, 2019, Kifer arrived at the Civic Center Complex wanting to make a report at the police station. … Kifer entered the Civic Center Complex through the entrance closest to the police department. Two officers staffed the entrance and both of them knew Kifer and were aware that he was banned from the building. The officers did not ask him to leave, nor did an officer escort Kifer, and there is no evidence an escort request had been made. Kifer passed through the entrance’s screening mechanisms and proceeded to the police department to make his report. After entering the police department and reporting the alleged crime, Kifer was placed under arrest.
On March 6, 2019, the State filed an Information, charging Kifer with criminal trespass, a Class A misdemeanor, which was enhanced to a Level 6 felony due to a prior trespass conviction. On April 12, 2019, the trial court conducted a bifurcated jury trial, at the close of which Kifer was found guilty of criminal trespass. He subsequently admitted to the prior conviction under the enhancement charge. On May 21, 2019, Kifer was sentenced to a two-year executed sentence at the Department of Correction. ….
To convict Kifer of criminal trespass as a Class A misdemeanor, the State was required to establish that Kifer, not having a contractual interest in the property, knowingly or intentionally entered the real property of the Building Authority after having been denied entry by the Building Authority’s agent. See I.C. § 35-43-2-2. …
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… At trial, Rector testified that in his capacity of general manager of the Building Authority he has “the authority to trespass people.” … He banned Kifer after being “notified by judicial officers, law enforcement officials, elected department heads[.]” However, as Rector is the general manager employed by the Building Authority, he is not the agent of judicial officers, law enforcement officials, or elected department heads and therefore cannot derive his authority from them, absent a specific court order. … Accordingly, the State did not carry its burden of proof.
Furthermore, as an issue of first impression, Kifer contends that an agent cannot ban a person forever and permanently from a public building. The parties did not cite any authority, nor did our independent research disclose any precedential jurisprudence on the issue. As a persuasive precedent, we note that the Alaska Court of Appeals addressed this specific question in Turney v. State, 922 P.2d 283 (Ak. Ct. App. 1996).
… the Turney court concluded that the Alaska trespass statute is “a general statute which provides that a person may not remain on property after being lawfully ordered to leave. [T]his type of statute is generally construed not to grant officials the authority to permanently ban people from public facilities. [We] hold that this statute did not authorize the Area Court Administrator to permanently ban Turney from the courthouse property.”
Indiana’s trespass statute is likewise a general statute which provides that a person cannot knowingly or intentionally enter real property after having been denied entry by the property owner’s agent. See I.C. § 35-43-2-2. While Rector’s letter, dated March 1, 2005, banned Kifer from the property, it purported to operate as a perpetual ban, advising that Kifer was “no longer permitted to be in the Civic Center Complex.” Approximately fourteen years later, Kifer entered the Civic Center Complex to report a crime in which he was the alleged victim. Kifer was not acting in an offensive, abusive, or obstreperous manner. It was only after he was allowed to enter without any problems and after he had reported his perceived crime, that Kifer was arrested on the alleged authority of a fourteen-year old letter.
The police station is a facility devoted to serving and protecting the public at large, including Kifer. We find it unreasonable to construe the trespass statute to allow a citizen to be permanently and perpetually banned from the premises of a public building intended to serve the community and which housed several facilities that citizens need to access intermittently in the operation of daily life. ….
Reversed.
Baker, J. and Brown, J. concur