Alisha Gets Annoyed In ninth grade geometry class, Alisha gets annoyed with the girl sitting at the desk next to her, so gets up and moves in the middle of the teacher giving a lecture. She sits down in a seat in the back of the classroom as the teacher looks up from her PowerPoint and says, “Alisha, please return to your seat.” Alisha said, “I don’t want to sit by her, she’s chewing her gum in my ear.” The entire class giggled while the other girl’s face turned red. The teacher asked her twice more to move back, and turned back to her PowerPoint when Alisha promised she would not move again. Alisha was in a bad mood to start the day and when the guy she had just sat down next to leaned over and told her she was mean, she got up again. The teacher now began to grow irate, asking Alisha to sit down and stay there or she would be carted off to the principal’s office. Alisha defiantly stood up, and moved to a seat on the other end of the classroom.
Can Alisha be charged with disorderly conduct? [Under Virginia Code Section 18.2-4615, a person is guilty of disorderly conduct if, with the intent to cause public inconvenience, annoyance or alarm, or recklessly creating a risk thereof, he willfully disrupts the operation of any school or any activity conducted or sponsored by a school if the disruption prevents or interferes with the orderly conduct of the operation or activity. However, the conduct prohibited by the code section shall not be deemed to include any utterance or display of any words or to include conduct otherwise made punishable under title 18 of the Virginia code. Because moving desks against the teacher’s wishes is not speech, nor is it a crime punishable by another section of Virginia code, Alisha likely can be charged with disorderly conduct.]
What if Alisha smacked the boy who told her she was mean instead of simply moving desks? Could she be charged with disorderly conduct? [What Alisha does in this case is considered battery. Because there is a section in title 18 of the Virginia Code, she cannot be charged with disorderly conduct, but she can be charged with battery.]
What if Alisha instead simply argues heatedly with her teacher about why she wanted to move? [Under the Virginia code section, “the utterance or display of any words” is not conduct that falls under disorderly conduct, so she cannot be charged with that crime. However, she could be charged with a violation of section 18.2-416, which permits punishment for using abusive language to another, if her speech reaches the level of cursing or abusing another person, or using any violent abusive language to such person concerning himself or any of his relations, or otherwise using such language, under circumstances reasonably calculated to provoke a breach of the peace.]
CODE LANGUAGE: A person is guilty of disorderly conduct if, with the intent to cause public inconvenience, annoyance or alarm, or recklessly creating a risk thereof, he:
A. In any street, highway, public building, or while in or on a public conveyance, or public place engages in conduct having a direct tendency to cause acts of violence by the person or persons at whom, individually, such conduct is directed; or B. Willfully or being intoxicated, whether willfully or not, and whether such intoxication results from self-administered alcohol or other drug of whatever nature, disrupts any funeral, memorial service, or meeting of the governing body of any political subdivision of this Commonwealth or a division or agency thereof, or of any school, literary society or place of religious worship, *139 if the disruption (i) prevents or interferes with the orderly conduct of the funeral, memorial service, or meeting or (ii) has a direct tendency to cause acts of violence by the person or persons at whom, individually, the disruption is directed; or C. Willfully or while intoxicated, whether willfully or not, and whether such intoxication results from self-administered alcohol or other drug of whatever nature, disrupts the operation of any school or any activity conducted or sponsored by any school, if the disruption (i) prevents or interferes with the orderly conduct of the operation or activity or (ii) has a direct tendency to cause acts of violence by the person or persons at whom, individually, the disruption is directed.
However, the conduct prohibited under subdivision A, B or C of this section shall not be deemed to include the utterance or display of any words or to include conduct otherwise made punishable under this title.