Los Angeles Disorderly Conduct Attorney

Disorderly conduct charges are intimidating. If charged, your criminal record, your job, and your future can all be affected. In the state of California, disorderly conduct is also referred to as “disturbing the peace.” It encompasses actions that are disruptive and interrupt public activity or spaces. While the severity of punishments varies depending on your exact charge, a disorderly conduct offense is never easy to deal with alone. If you were arrested on charges of disorderly conduct in the Los Angeles area, it’s crucial that you seek an attorney that you can trust to help you fight them.

At the Law Office of Stein & Markus, our attorneys have over five decades of experience in criminal defense. After defending hundreds of clients with successful outcomes, our team is ready to win their next case by helping you with your charge. Whether you are facing minor disorderly conduct charges or serious criminal offenses, no other legal team can represent you as we can. With our extensive experience, compassionate approach, and knowledge of the law, our team can guide you through your case and fight for the best outcome possible. Contact our firm to see how our attorneys can assist you with disorderly conduct charges in the Los Angeles area today.

What Is “Disturbing the Peace” In California?

According to the California Penal Code, disturbing the peace occurs when the behavior of a person or group is offensive, disruptive, or drastically interrupts a public space or activity that is taking place. Disturbing the peace or disorderly conduct in California law is broken down into the following categories:

General Disorderly Conduct
General disorderly conduct covers a wide range of actions that are considered disruptive. Being too intoxicated (on drugs or alcohol) in public, invading a person’s privacy, or loitering are all actions that could land someone a disorderly conduct charge. General disorderly conduct can also cover behaviors such as refusal to leave a property or disruptive loitering. If charged, penalties range from a fine to jail time.

Fighting / Excessive Noise / Offensive Language or Actions
Challenging someone to a fight, engaging in violent behavior, as well as fighting someone without the “right” to do so in public, are all considered methods of disturbing the peace in California. For instance, if two people get into a violent fight in a restaurant parking lot, they are engaging in disruptive behavior. Because of their actions and their location, they can be arrested for disorderly conduct.

Noise issues are another popular charge for disturbing the peace. Playing music that is much too loud, excessive noise from your home, loud arguments, etc., are all examples of noise issues that can become disorderly conduct offenses quickly, especially if you live somewhere with neighbors that are close by.

Offensive language and behavior can both be classified as disorderly conduct—that is when it can be proven that it was done intentionally. For example, using a slur in front of a public crowd with the specific intention to degrade someone or offend and hurt them could result in a disorderly conduct charge.

Riot
California Penal Code 404 defines a riot as disturbing the peace, using force or violence, or threatening to do so, with a group of two or more people, and without the authority of law. In simpler terms, a riot is when a group of people commit violent conduct in public or against public order and refuse to disperse.

The important difference between riots and unlawful gatherings is that riots are considered to have some form of violence involved. For example, if peaceful protesters gathered outside a local government office without permission and then the group was asked to disperse and did not, the people that were present could be charged with unlawful gathering in a public space. If that same protest was to get violent, cause property damage, and result in injuries, whether it was law officials or other groups of people, those arrested would be charged with rioting.

Disturbing the Peace on a School Campus
Disturbing the peace on a school campus is a separate category from disorderly conduct for a few reasons. The main reason is that it is illegal for people that are not students at a school to engage in disorderly conduct such as fighting, using excessive noise or offensive language, and rioting on school property. For instance, if a group of protestors that were not students decided to gather on a college campus with blow horns to spread whatever message they have, they can be charged for disturbing the peace on a college campus as they didn’t have permission to be there in the first place and were disruptive in addition to it.

Refusal to Disperse
Refusal to disperse is a form of disturbing the peace in California that refers to a group of two or more people gathering in public, ignoring public order and authority, and continuing with their actions. This can include failure to listen to a police officer if they ask your group to leave a public area. Refusal to disperse charges is often seen when law officers get involved at protests and the protestors will not leave, resulting in arrests. They can also happen when a group of people are loitering and refuse to leave an area they don’t have permission to be in.

Improper Sexual Conduct
Disorderly conduct charges can also cover a variety of improper sexual acts, most often those that occur in public places. “Peeping” occurs when an individual is invading a person’s privacy for sexual gratification. Engagement in prostitution, or soliciting it, as well as other lewd acts in public. These actions all qualify as a form of disorderly conduct in California.

Being Charged with Disorderly Conduct Violations in California

Even if you were arrested on a disorderly conduct offense, there is still a possibility that you won’t be charged with it in the end. In order to be charged with disorderly conduct or disturbing the peace in California, the local prosecution needs to be able to prove multiple of the following factors, (depending on what kind of disorderly conduct your case involves):

It Was Done Willfully 
When trying to charge a defendant with disturbing the peace in California, the prosecution needs to prove or have the jury conclude that the actions were performed willingly. This means that the defendant in question chose to break or violate the law and they intended on doing so. While some behaviors themselves may not be breaking the law, like playing music too loud, it’s the act of doing so to purposefully disrupt others that can be. If someone was, for example, under the influence against their will, it could be proven that the actions they performed were not done willingly, allowing them to avoid charges.

Occurred in a Public Place
One of the biggest factors that classify a charge like disorderly conduct or disturbing the peace is whether or not the defendant’s actions occurred in a public place. Whether a person was using excessive noise and bothering others or they started a violent fight, the property the defendant was on was not theirs, to begin with. This means they don’t have the right to do either of these things on that property or disturb the peace of that given area.

Malicious Intent
While malicious intent is not always an aspect of every disorderly conduct charge, it can make penalties more severe if the prosecution can prove it was there. For example, if two people who had previous disagreements get into a fight at a bar that resulted in one of them being seriously injured, the prosecution could attempt to prove malicious intent was there because the defendant already disliked the person whom they injured. Malicious intent is not always easy to prove, but if it is there it can easily change a disorderly conduct charge from an infraction to a misdemeanor.

Unlawfulness
Unlawfulness plays a part in most disorderly conduct cases. A defendant’s actions may not seem to be illegal, but when they perform them in a public space without the right to do so, it can turn into a violation of the law. Therefore, it makes whatever the defendant was doing unlawful. Disorderly conduct charges for fighting in public areas are the most common cases you will see unlawfulness used in a trial.

Challenged Someone in a Fight or Fought Someone

If the prosecution is trying to charge the defendant with disorderly conduct for fighting, they need to be able to prove in trial that the defendant did indeed challenge someone to a fight and it was disruptive or that they got into an actual violent altercation with another person. If there is not enough evidence that the defendant was in the fight or started the fight in question, then they might be able to avoid the charges and penalties with the right legal team. In many cases, especially with larger fights, multiple people may be arrested but only the ones who started the fight or were most involved are ultimately charged.

Misdemeanors vs. Infractions in California 

When dealing with a disorderly conduct case, you will come across the terms “misdemeanor” and “infraction” quite often. These are some of the classifications of disorderly conduct charges– and they will have an effect on the penalties that are received if the defendant is found guilty.

In California, a misdemeanor is defined as a crime where a person cannot receive more than a maximum of 1 year in jail for their offense. To put it into perspective, a misdemeanor is less serious than a felony but more serious than an infraction.

An infraction, on the other hand, is what minor offenses are usually classified as within California law. Infractions are not considered crimes in the eyes of the law, but just violations. If someone is being charged with an infraction, the maximum penalty they can receive is a fine of $250 and the court is not allowed to sentence jail time as punishment. Infractions are more like tickets whereas a misdemeanor is considered a crime.