§ 140B.061.Criminal Offense: Deliberate Noncompliance

The criminal offense protecting the investigative power, and its catchline names it as one.

A person commits an offense if, with intent to avoid, evade, or prevent compliance with a demand, they knowingly remove from any place, conceal, withhold, destroy, mutilate, alter, or by any other means falsify any documentary material or otherwise provide inaccurate information.

An offense under this section is a Class A misdemeanor — the punishment stated by grade rather than spelled out. The older chapter writes the same exposure the long way, as up to $5,000, up to a year in county jail, or both.

Stating the grade is the better drafting. A grade tracks the Penal Code, so a later change to Class A punishment carries through; a hard-coded figure does not.

Two mental states must both be proved. The removal or falsification must be knowing, and it must be carried out with intent to defeat the demand. Ordinary document destruction under a retention schedule is neither.

The timing question is the practical one. Once a demand has been served, a retention policy that would otherwise delete the material is no longer neutral — continuing it knowing what it will destroy is close to the line the section draws.

The verbs cover more than destruction. "Withhold" reaches keeping what one has, and "otherwise provide inaccurate information" reaches false interrogatory answers and false testimony.

That last limb gives the sworn certificates their force. Certifying an incomplete production as complete is providing inaccurate information to defeat a demand.

The offense also fills the gap enforcement leaves. A court order compels production of what still exists; this reaches the person who made sure it did not.