Diannia R. Taylor v. Reginald B. Taylor ( 2023 )

THE STATE OF SOUTH CAROLINA
In The Court of Appeals
Diannia R. Taylor, Appellant,
v.
Reginald B. Taylor, Respondent.
Appellate Case No. 2019-002084
Appeal From Greenville County
Tarita A. Dunbar, Family Court Judge
Opinion No. 5978
Submitted December 1, 2022 – Filed April 12, 2023
REVERSED
Melinda Q. Taylor, of Collins Family Law Group, of
Monroe, North Carolina, and Tamika Devlin Cannon, of
S.C. Victim Assistance Network, of Taylors, both for
Appellant.
Walter Christopher Castro, of ALAW, of Greenville, for
Respondent.
HILL, A.J.: Diannia Taylor (Mother) petitioned the family court for various relief,
including for an order of protection under the Protection from Domestic Abuse Act 1
(the Act) based on allegations her husband, Reginald B. Taylor (Husband), had
physically and sexually abused her. Mother also alleged Husband had molested
1
S.C. Code Ann. § 20-4-10 to -160 (2014 & Supp. 2022).
A.R., her minor daughter from a previous relationship. Mother sought protection
from Husband for herself and A.R., as well as custody of the couple's minor sons.
At the emergency hearing, Mother and Husband indicated they had reached an
agreement as to the order of protection for Mother but not as to an order of protection
for A.R. The family court granted the order of protection as to Mother, finding
Husband abused Mother and A.R. However, the family court ruled it could not
include A.R. in the order of protection because A.R. did not meet the definition of
"household member" under the Act. Mother now appeals.
I. DISCUSSION
Mother argues the family court erred in ruling the Act does not allow orders of
protection to be granted to minor household members such as A.R. who are not
spouses of, former spouses of, previous cohabitants with, or who have a child in
common with the alleged abuser.
This appeal turns on the Act's legislative intent. In construing this intent, we begin
by reviewing the text of the Act. When the text is plain and unambiguous, we must
enforce it as written. Smith v. Tiffany, 419 S.C. 548, 555–56, 799 S.E.2d 479, 483
(2017). We have no license to alter or shade the plain meaning in an effort to stretch
or shrink the scope of a statute. Centex Int'l, Inc. v. S.C. Dep't of Revenue, 406 S.C.
132, 139, 750 S.E.2d 65, 69 (2013). Nor do we have any authority to isolate the
words of a statute and ignore our obligation to interpret the statute as a whole,
harmonizing the statutory scheme by giving each section effect. Id.The phrase "household member" is plainly defined by the Act as:
(i) a spouse;
(ii) a former spouse;
(iii) persons who have a child in common;
(iv) a male and female who are cohabiting or formerly
have cohabited.
S.C. Code Ann. § 20-4-20(b) (2014 & Supp. 2022). This definition does not include
a minor such as A.R. See Fruehauf Trailer Co. v. S.C. Elec. & Gas Co., 223 S.C.
320, 325, 75 S.E.2d 688, 690 (1953) (legislative definition "should be followed in
the interpretation of the act or section to which it relates and is intended to apply").
However, our inquiry into whether the legislature intended A.R. to be entitled to an
order of protection under the Act does not end here. This is so because, as we shall
see, the Act unquestionably refers to protecting "minor" household members several
times, without further definition.
To advance our inquiry, we first consider what the words of the Act tell us about its
intended scope. "'Order of protection' means an order of protection issued to protect
the petitioner or minor household members from the abuse of another household
member . . . ." S.C. Code Ann. § 20-4-20(f) (2014). "'Abuse' means: (1) physical
harm, bodily injury, assault, or the threat of physical harm; (2) sexual criminal
offenses, as otherwise defined by statute, committed against a family or household
member by a family or household member." S.C. Code Ann. § 20-4-20(a) (2014).
"A petition for relief under this section may be made by any household members in
need of protection or by any household members on behalf of minor household
members." S.C. Code Ann. § 20-4-40(a) (2014).
We pause to acknowledge that since the Act's passage in 1984, the legislature has
tweaked the definition of "household member" several times. 1994 Act No. 519, §§
2, 3; 2003 Act No. 92, § 11; 2005 Act No. 166, § 7. The evolution of the definition
of the term shows the legislature has consistently narrowed it down to its current
definition as shown above. This could suggest the legislature intended to make the
Act inapplicable to most minors, as few minors would meet the current definition of
"household members." However, we find the language the legislature has left in the
Act is more compelling then what it has taken out. Despite the Act's several
revisions, the legislature has retained the phrase "minor household members" in §
20-4-20(a) and § 20-4-40(a). By keeping the phrase "minor household members" in
the Act, we infer the legislature intended to allow minors who do not meet § 20-4-
20(b)'s definition of "household members" to receive orders of protection from
domestic abuse. After all, there would be no need for the legislature to include the
word "minor" before "household members" if it intended for the Act to only protect
minors who already met the narrow definition of "household members." Such
minors would simply be "household members," leaving the word "minor" with no
work to do. See CFRE, LLC v. Greenville Cnty. Accessor, 395 S.C. 67, 74, 716
S.E.2d 877, 881 (2011) (providing courts "must read the statute so 'that no word,
clause, sentence, provision or part shall be rendered surplusage, or superfluous,' for
'[t]he General Assembly obviously intended [the statute] to have some efficacy, or
the legislature would not have enacted it into law.'" (alterations in original) (quoting
State v. Sweat, 379 S.C. 367, 377, 382, 665 S.E.2d 645, 651, 654 (Ct. App. 2008))).
We conclude the Act extends protection to minor household members such as A.R.
This construction of the Act best comports with the purpose and intent of the Act.
See Doe v. State, 421 S.C. 490, 505, 808 S.E.2d 807, 815 (2017) (stating the "overall
legislative purpose [of the Act] is to protect victims from domestic violence that
occurs within the home and between members of the home"); Moore v. Moore, 376
S.C. 467, 476, 657 S.E.2d 743, 748 (2008) ("The Protection from Domestic Abuse
Act was enacted to deal with the problem of abuse between family members. The
effect of the Act was to bring the parties before a judge as quickly as possible to
prevent further violence."); see also 2A Sutherland Statutory Construction § 47.7
(7th ed.) (statutory definitions may not bind courts when they "defeat a statute's
major purpose"). Our conclusion gathers further support from the text of §
20-4-60(a) (2014), which provides orders of protection "shall . . . protect the
petitioner or the abused person or persons on whose behalf the petition was filed
. . . ." As we have seen, the only persons who may have a petition filed on their
behalf are "minor household members." § 20-4-40(a). If the only minors the Act
protected were minors who are spouses of, former spouses of, cohabitants with, or
who have a child in common with the abuser, it would be unlikely in such instances
that there would also be an adult who met the technical definition of "household
member" so as to allow the adult to file a petition for protection on the minor's behalf.
That would mean such minors would not have access to the courts to enforce the
Act.
Interpreting the Act as only protecting minors who meet the definition of household
members thwarts the purpose and intent of the Act. It would also leave us with an
Act that allows a petitioner living in a household with a domestic abuser to deploy
the Act to protect their pets but not their children. Unisun Ins. Co. v. Schmidt, 339
S.C. 362, 368, 529 S.E.2d 280, 283 (2000) ("We will reject
a statutory interpretation when to accept it would lead to a result so
plainly absurd that it could not have been intended by the legislature or would defeat
the plain legislative intention."); S.C. Code Ann. § 20-4-60(C)(8) (Supp. 2022)
(providing in an order of protection, the family court may prohibit the respondent
harming or harassing "any pet animal owned, possessed, kept, or held by: (a) the
petitioner; (b) any family or household member designated in the order; (c) the
respondent if the petitioner has a demonstrated interest in the pet animal"); cf. State
v. Walker, 422 S.C. 89, 90–91, 810 S.E.2d 38, 39 (2018) (holding § 16-25-10(3)'s
definition of "household member" for purposes of determining early parole
eligibility for persons convicted of crimes against a household member did not apply
to defendant who had murdered father who had abused him).
We therefore interpret the term "minor household member" as used in the Act to
include all minors who need protection and who live in the same household as a
petitioner and an abusive household member, not just minors who meet the strict
definition of "household member" set forth in section 20-4-20(b). Because A.R. was
a minor living in the same home as the petitioner (Mother) and the alleged abuser
(Husband), we find the family court erred by not granting an order of protection to
A.R.
REVERSED. 2
GEATHERS and MCDONALD, JJ., concur.
2
We decide this case without oral argument pursuant to Rule 215, SCACR.