In Re Dallas W.

On a summer day, as 16-year-old Dallas W. and four friends walked along a public street in Artesia, Dallas twice stopped to moon oncoming traffic. Sean Warner, an employee of the City of Artesia, happened to be across the street. “[A]ngry and concerned for the safety of people in the street,” Warner called the police. When a deputy sheriff responded, Warner was quite “adamant that he wanted some action taken being that he was working for the City . . . .” Warner demanded that Dallas be detained and cited, which he was. Dallas was charged by petition (Welf. & Inst. Code, § 602) with misdemeanor indecent exposure (Pen. Code, § 314, subd. I), and an adjudication hearing was held. The juvenile court found this was “a mooning case,” and that Dallas had “exposed his buttocks . . . with the intent to annoy and affront people.” The court specifically found that Dallas did not act with “sexual intent in the sense that he intended to arouse himself or a third person by his act. I think he did it strictly to annoy and to affront people.” The petition was nevertheless sustained, and Dallas was made a ward of the court. He appeals. Because the court found Dallas acted without any…