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State v. Pauling9/17/2001
A.04.110(25) to which the example corresponds.
(d) 'If you don't pay for the value of my property that you vandalized I am going to report you to the police.'
(e) 'I have put up for auction and am accepting bids for papers I possess that reveal salacious secrets regarding celebrity X.' This could be interpreted as a threat to the celebrity to reveal the private information if the celebrity did not submit the winning bid.
(f) 'If you want to have an unlisted telephone number the fee is $50 per year.'
(g) Expert witness: 'I will not testify until my fee is paid.' Non-expert witness: 'I am not going to testify unless you pay my travel expenses.'
(i) Labor activist: 'U.S. labor unions will organize a boycott of your retail stores unless you pay your Third World employees at least 30 percent of the prevailing U.S. wage for textile workers.' Environmental activist: 'We will organize a boycott of your coffee if you don't pay a higher price for coffee beans from independent farmers of shade grown coffee.'
(j) Regarding 'business' -- consumer to vendor: 'If you don't give me a refund for the defective product I purchased I will complain to the Better Business Bureau, the attorney general, and the consumer advocate at the local newspaper.'
Large company to the management of a small competitor: 'If you don't agree to be acquired by us we are going to spend $150 million developing a product and business relationships that will compete with yours.' 'If you don't agree to sell out to us at the price we demand, we will attempt a hostile takeover and replace you with more sympathetic directors and management.'
Regarding financial condition -- large minority shareholder: 'If you don't repurchase my shares at my purchase price, I am going to bring a class action shareholder suit for breach of fiduciary duty.'
Washington's extortion statute substantially burdens a wide range of protected speech. There is no question that Pauling's action was outrageous and should have been subject to criminal sanction. But, because the extortion statute is impossibly overbroad and restricts a wide range of protected speech, we are compelled to invalidate it.
We reverse the conviction.
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