What is the test for an individual to be convicted of perverting the course of justice in a sexual assault case?

[169 Cal.App.3d 504] "One of the purposes of the criminal law is to protect society from those who intend to injure it. When it is established that the defendant intended to commit a specific crime and that in carrying out this intention he committed an act that caused harm or sufficient danger of harm, it is immaterial that for some collateral reason he could not complete the intended crime. Although the law does not impose punishment for guilty intent alone, it does impose punishment when guilty intent is coupled with action that would result in a crime but for the intervention of some fact or circumstance unknown to the defendant. [Citations omitted.] In the present case there was not a legal but only a factual impossibility of consummating the intended offense, i.e., the intended victim was not deceived." (Id., at p. 147, 338 P.2d 903. See also Faustina v. Superior Court (1959) 174 Cal.App.2d 830, 833-834, 345 P.2d 543.)