Justia California Court of Appeals Opinion Summaries

Defendant Tyrus Hull appealed his conviction for assaulting Marqurus Bonner with a deadly weapon (motor vehicle), for which he was sentenced defendant to two years in state prison. On appeal, defendant argued: (1) the trial court erred in admitting at trial a prosecution witness' preliminary hearing testimony after he invoked the right to remain silent because the defense did not have the opportunity to cross-examine the witness about a prior criminal conviction not disclosed by the prosecution until after the preliminary hearing or about alleged threats made to defendant’s wife the day after defendant’s arrest; (2) instead of allowing the prior testimony, either the trial court or the prosecutor should have provided the witness use immunity and the prosecutor failed to adequately explain his reason for declining to provide immunity; (3) the manner of reading the preliminary hearing testimony was inappropriate and imputed the demeanor of the reader to the witness; and (4) counsel at his preliminary hearing was constitutionally ineffective for failure to cross-examine the witness regarding his alleged participation in threatening and intimidating defendant’s wife the day after the alleged assault occurred. In the published portion of its opinion, the Court of Appeal concluded: (1) the trial court was not required to grant immunity, because the defense did not establish that what it hoped to gain by cross-examination was clearly exculpatory and essential; (2) the prosecution was not obligated to explain not giving the witness immunity because the defense failed to show that the testimony it hoped to gain was clearly exculpatory and essential, and because defendant did not clearly assert that the prosecutor’s refusal to grant immunity was prosecutorial misconduct; (3) failure to disclose the witness’s criminal history before the preliminary hearing deprived defendant of the opportunity to cross-examine the witness about it at the preliminary hearing, but this error was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt; and (4) the defense could not forgo cross-examining a witness at a preliminary hearing about information then known to defendant or the defense team and later prevent the introduction of the preliminary hearing testimony at trial under Evidence Code section 1291 on the grounds that the defendant did not have the same motive or opportunity for cross-examination at the preliminary hearing. In the unpublished portion of its opinion, the Court concluded further there was nothing inappropriate about the reading of the preliminary hearing testimony, and that defendant failed to establish ineffective assistance of counsel. View "California v. Hull" on Justia Law

Veronica Aguayo hit her elderly father about 50 times with a bicycle lock and chain, then threw a ceramic pot on his head. Aguayo was working on her bicycle in her parents' yard. Her 72-year-old father (Father) turned on the sprinklers to water the plants, accidentally wetting Aguayo's cell phone charger. A jury found her guilty of assault with a deadly weapon other than a firearm and assault by means of force likely to produce great bodily injury (force-likely assault). The trial court placed her on probation. Aguayo appealed. In the Court of Appeal's original opinion, it rejected the sole issue Aguayo initially asserted: that the Court had to vacate her conviction for force-likely assault because it was a lesser included offense of assault with a deadly weapon. Aguayo then filed a petition for rehearing in which she challenged the reasoning of the first opinion and asserted a new argument based on legislation enacted while this appeal was pending. Specifically, she argued that newly enacted Penal Code sections 1001.35 and 1001.36, which grant trial courts the discretion to place defendants with mental disorders into pretrial diversion, apply retroactively to her case. The Court once again rejected the lesser-included-offense argument Aguayo originally raised. With respect to the newly raised issue here, the Court concluded the mental health diversion legislation applied retroactively; Aguayo made a showing of potential eligibility sufficient to warrant a remand for further proceedings. View "California v. Aguayo" on Justia Law

In exchange for a stipulated 11-year sentence and the dismissal of other counts, Justin Michael Wright pleaded guilty to transporting a controlled substance. He also admitted having a strike prior and one prior conviction for a violation of Health & Safety Code section 11351.5, thereby triggering the imposition of a three-year enhancement under section 11370.2(a). In a written plea agreement, Wright waived his right to appeal, including among other things, "any sentence stipulated herein." The court sentenced Wright to the stipulated 11-year prison term, which consisted of the four-year midterm doubled for the strike prior, plus a three-year enhancement under 11370.2(a). In October 2017 the Governor signed Senate Bill No. 180, which amended section 11370.2, effective January 1, 2018, to limit the scope of the enhancement to apply only to prior convictions for a violation of section 11380.2. Wright appealed, contending the ameliorative provision of the amended section 11370.2 applied retroactively because he case was not yet final, and the Court of Appeal should have vacated the now-inapplicable three-year enhancement. The Court of Appeal concluded Wright did not waive the right to appeal future sentencing error based on a change in the law of which he was unaware at the time he entered his plea. Accordingly, Wright's conviction was affirmed, but his sentence was reversed and the case remanded to the trial court with directions to strike the section 11370.2(a) enhancement and to resentence Wright accordingly. View "California v. Wright" on Justia Law

During the course of the 2016 political campaign to represent the 49th Congressional District, challenger candidate Doug Applegate's campaign ran two television advertisements about incumbent Darrell Issa that Issa contends were false and defamatory. Issa filed a lawsuit against Applegate, Doug Applegate for Congress, Inc., and Robert Dempsey (the respondents), alleging libel based on statements made in these two television advertisements. The trial court granted the respondents' anti-SLAPP motion and entered judgment in favor of the respondents on Issa's complaint. Issa appealed. While "[i]t is abhorrent that many political campaigns are mean- spirited affairs that shower the voters with invective instead of insight[,]" in order "to ensure the preservation of a citizen's right of free expression, we must allow wide latitude." The Court of Appeal ultimately concluded the trial court properly granted the respondents' anti-SLAPP motion because Issa could not demonstrate the statements about which he complained were demonstrably false statements of fact. View "Issa v. Applegate" on Justia Law

During the pendency of his appeal of a postjudgment order denying defendant Rafael Servin compassionate release from prison, he died. The appellate proceedings were therefore abated. Nevertheless, the Court of Appeal filed this opinion to make two points: (1) the statutory requirements and the standard of appellate review explained in Martinez v. Board of Parole Hearings, 183 Cal.App.4th 578 (2010) applied in all cases under Penal Code section 1170(e), whether the defendant or the State appeals; and (2) to alert the Attorney General and the criminal defense bar to the necessity of immediately advising the appellate court of the time exigency and the need for calendar preference in compassionate release cases. View "California v. Servin" on Justia Law

The Court of Appeal held that recording secret business conversations and using the recordings in an arbitration were not in connection with a judicial or official proceeding authorized by law, and therefore they were not protected activities under Code of Civil Procedure section 425.16 (the anti-SLAPP statute).In this case, after defendant, the president of Tang Energy Corp., secretly recorded conversations with Sherman Xuming Zhang, president of AVIC International USA, defendant introduced the recordings as evidence in contractual arbitration. When the arbitrators decided the issue in favor of Tang Energy, Zhang and AVIC filed suit against defendant for invasion of privacy and eavesdropping on or recording confidential communications in violation of Penal Code sections 632 and 637.2. The court affirmed the trial court's denial of defendant's special motion to strike under section 425.16. View "Zhang v. Jenevein" on Justia Law

Frederick Theodore Rall III, a political cartoonist and blogger, filed suit against the Los Angeles Times after it published a "note to readers" and a later more detailed report questioning the accuracy of a blog post plaintiff wrote for The Times. The Court of Appeal affirmed the trial court's grant of defendants' anti-SLAPP (strategic lawsuit against public participation) motions to strike the complaint.The court held that The Times' articles were published in a public forum and concerned issues of public interest, and thus the written statements were protected free speech activity. Furthermore, the articles were absolutely privileged under Civil Code section 47, subdivision (d), because they were a fair and true report of an LAPD investigation that was central to the substance of the articles. Therefore, plaintiff failed to produce evidence demonstrating a probability of prevailing on his defamation claims. In regard to plaintiff's wrongful termination claims, the court held that plaintiff's employment claims arose directly from The Times's protected First Amendment conduct: deciding not to publish plaintiff's work. Therefore, plaintiff failed to establish a probability of prevailing on the merits of his employment claims. View "Rall v. Tribune 365 LLC" on Justia Law

Defendant Davonte Stinson and codefendant Dontae McFadden approached S.A. in his parked car and, at gunpoint, took several items from him including his wallet, keys, and cell phone. Still at gunpoint, they made S.A. move from the driver’s seat to the trunk, placed him in the trunk and closed it, and then continued to look through the car. Defendant and codefendant then fled, leaving S.A. in the trunk. Shortly thereafter, using S.A.’s keys, defendant and codefendant entered the apartment S.A. shared with his fiancé, A.L.G., and her two children. At gunpoint, they demanded that A.L.G. give them whatever guns and money that were in the apartment. After obtaining two guns and other items, they left. Defendant and codefendant were tried together. The jury found defendant guilty of kidnapping to commit robbery, robbery in the second degree, possession of a firearm by a felon, and robbery in the first degree. On appeal, defendant argued: (1) the trial court abused its discretion in denying the defense motion to sever count six (felon in possession of a firearm alleged against codefendant), charging only codefendant with being a felon in possession of a firearm based on the discovery of a handgun in codefendant’s backpack approximately three months after the robberies of S.A. and A.L.G; (2) the evidence was legally insufficient to support the conviction of kidnapping to commit robbery because it failed to establish that the movement of S.A. from the driver’s seat to the trunk of his car was more than incidental to the commission of the robbery and that it increased the risk of harm to S.A.; and (3) the court erred in the manner in which it modified CALCRIM No. 1203. In the published portion of its opinion, the Court of Appeal concluded the trial court did not err in instructing the jury with the modified version of CALCRIM No. 1203. In the unpublished portions of this opinion, the Court concluded the trial court did not abuse its discretion in denying the defense motion to sever; nor were defendant’s due process and fair trial rights violated by the joinder. Furthermore, the evidence was legally sufficient to support the conviction of kidnapping to commit robbery. However, finding merit to the contentions raised by defendant in his supplemental briefing, the Court remanded this case back to the trial court for a Franklin hearing and for the trial court to exercise its discretion under Penal section 12022.53 (h), to consider whether to strike the section 12022.53 (b), enhancement. Otherwise, the Court affirmed. View "California v. Stinson" on Justia Law

In 2006, police arrested defendant Daniel Marquez in Ventura County on a drug possession offense. Without his consent, authorities collected Marquez’s DNA sample and entered his DNA profile into a statewide database. Marquez was never charged with the drug offense. In 2008, investigators retrieved DNA evidence from an Orange County robbery, and that evidence matched Marquez’s DNA profile in the database. Police contacted Marquez, and with his consent they collected a second DNA sample, which matched the DNA evidence from the robbery. The State filed two robbery counts and a related offense. The trial court denied Marquez’s motion to suppress the DNA evidence, and a jury convicted him of the charged offenses. The court sentenced Marquez to 25 years to life in state prison, plus an additional 15 years for three alleged prior serious felony convictions. The Court of Appeal held that the 2006 collection of Marquez’s DNA sample was unlawful under the Fourth Amendment; the prosecution failed to prove that Marquez was validly arrested or that his DNA was collected as part of a routine booking procedure. However, the trial court properly admitted the 2008 DNA evidence under a well-established exception to the exclusionary rule: the attenuation doctrine. Additionally, due to a recent statutory change, the Court remanded for the trial court to consider striking the additional punishment for Marquez’s three prior serious felony convictions. The Court also ordered the trial court to modify Marquez’s custody credits. In all other respects, the judgment was affirmed. View "California v. Marquez" on Justia Law

Defendant Andy Hem fatally shot his brother, victim Sokorng “Sok” Hem in 2014. The State argued the shooting was first degree murder; defendant claimed self-defense. The jury found defendant guilty of voluntary manslaughter and discharging a firearm in a grossly negligent manner, finding he personally used a firearm. Defendant was sentenced to prison for 16 years. On appeal defendant contended the prosecutor misstated the law in closing argument, the court improperly excluded evidence, the court failed to conduct an adequate (or any) inquiry into a claim of jury misconduct, and he was entitled to a sentencing remand under Senate Bill No. 620 (2017-2018 Reg. Sess.), effective January 1, 2018, which gave trial courts new discretion to strike certain enhancements. The Court of Appeal determined the trial court did not adequately address jury misconduct, which as a matter of law, raised a presumption of prejudice. "The jury deliberations were difficult, as reflected by pointed written questions submitted by the jury, a reported deadlock, and what seems to have been a compromise verdict. In these circumstances, we cannot find that the presumption of prejudice was dispelled by the record and we must reverse the judgment." View "California v. Hem" on Justia Law