Justia Criminal Law Opinion Summaries

The defendant was convicted of first-degree burglary, petty theft with a prior theft-related conviction, and two counts of criminal threats. He was on bail at the time, had two prior strike offenses, two prior serious felony convictions, and two prior prison terms. The judge struck both of his strike priors, imposed a total sentence of 12 years, suspended execution of the sentence, and placed the defendant on four years of probation. He was to complete a particular residential treatment program from which he could not leave until approved to do so. After he twice violated the conditions of his probation, the defendant's probation was revoked.. The judge ordered the execution of the previously imposed but suspended 12-year sentence, with a total of 547 days of custody credit. The court of appeal remanded for resentencing. Assembly Bill 1950, which limits probation terms to two years for most felonies, did not invalidate the trial court’s revocation and termination of the defendant’s probation where such actions were properly taken before A.B. 1950’s effective date. The defendant’s section 667.5(b) prior prison term enhancements must be stricken because they were not based on sexually violent offenses. The defendant is entitled to additional credits. View "People v. Faial" on Justia Law

Kuhnel was convicted of misdemeanor embezzlement and placed on probation for three years in November 2016. In October 2017, the Orinda Police Department received a report that Kuhnel had committed new acts of fraud. In December 2017, the trial court summarily revoked Kuhnel’s probation and set a hearing on the violation for January 2018. The hearing was continued multiple times, on several occasions because Kuhnel failed to appear and twice at her request. Without the hearing ever being held, Kuhnel moved in June 2021 to terminate her probation, arguing that she had been on probation for more than one year and Assembly Bill 1950 applied retroactively to shorten her probationary term. AB 1950 retroactively limited the maximum probation term for a misdemeanor to one year.Reasoning that it retained jurisdiction to adjudicate violations that took place during the original term of probation, the trial court denied Kuhnel’s motion. The court of appeal denied Kuhnel’s petition for mandamus relief. The adjudication of violation and revocation of probation occurred before AB 1950 was enacted; they were appropriate under then-governing law, so the trial court retained jurisdiction to conduct a hearing on the probation violation after AB 1950’s effective date. View "Kuhnel v. Superior Court of Contra Costa County" on Justia Law

This case arose from the violent sexual assault and killing of an 84-year-old woman inside her home and during a burglary. After the first trial ended in a mistrial because the jury could not reach a unanimous verdict, a second jury found defendant Alvin Larry Davis guilty of first degree murder, and forcible sexual penetration with a foreign object, a cane. The jury also found true the enhancement allegations, and a special circumstance allegation. In a bifurcated proceeding, the trial court found defendant had two prior convictions that qualified as strikes under the three strikes law. The court sentenced him to life in prison without the possibility of parole. On appeal, defendant contended the judgment had to be reversed due to prejudicial evidentiary errors and prosecutorial misconduct during closing argument. Defendant primarily argued the trial court improperly admitted expert testimony based upon the application of the STRmix(TM) methodology (a method of DNA analysis): this evidence should have been excluded under the test for the admission of new scientific evidence established by the California Supreme Court in California v. Kelly 17 Cal.3d 24 (1976), abrogated by statute on another point in California v. Wilkinson, 33 Cal.4th 821 (2004). Defendant made additional claims of error that he conceded may have been forfeited; thus he argued in the alternative that his trial counsel rendered ineffective assistance and cumulative error. In the published portion of its opinion, the Court of Appeal concluded the trial court did not err in determining that the STRmix method of DNA analysis was generally accepted as reliable by the relevant scientific community, such that expert testimony relying on the method satisfied the first requirement of the Kelly test. In the unpublished portion of its opinion, the Court rejected or declined to consider the remaining claims of error and affirmed the judgment. View "California v. Davis" on Justia Law

Sheahan, a 75-year-old man suffering from late-stage lung cancer, was found dead in his San Francisco apartment on August 14. An autopsy indicated that the death was a homicide, that Sheahan had suffered 12–13 blunt force injuries to the head and cuts to his wrists, and that he had died between the evening of Friday August 11 and the morning of Monday August 14. A post-it note found in Sheahan’s apartment bearing the name “Mike” and a phone number led Sergeant Discenza to call Phillips. Phillips stated that he first learned of Sheahan’s death from Discenza and had last visited with Sheahan the previous Friday evening, the visit had been brief, he and Sheahan had been close friends. Security footage showed Phillips entering Sheahan's apartment repeatedly during the weekend; Sheahan's belongings were found in Phillips's possession.The court of appeal affirmed Phillips’s convictions for special circumstances murder, aggravated mayhem, first-degree robbery with great bodily injury, first-degree residential burglary, and several other crimes. The court rejected arguments that the trial court erred by admitting evidence of prior misconduct, allowing an officer to opine that a dark substance observed on Phillips’s cargo pants was blood, sustaining the prosecutor’s objection to a part of defense counsel’s closing argument, and denying a motion for mistrial after witnesses testified to an inadmissible hearsay statement. View "People v. Phillips" on Justia Law

The defendant was convicted for robbery and burglary. In 1996, the trial court sentenced him to 35 years to life in prison, with the bulk of that sentence attributable to the “Three Strikes” law. In 2021, the defendant filed a “Petition for Modification of Sentence (Pursuant to P.C. 1170(d)(1).)” based on “charging and sentencing policies” adopted by Los Angeles County District Attorney Gascón. The defendant quoted Penal Code section 1170(d)(1)1 and argued his 1996 sentence could be modified or recalled because “the district attorney’s office considers that only 15 years of the 25 years [he] already served is more than enough” and the court could consider, under the same statutory provision, his good conduct in prison.The trial court denied relief without appointing counsel for the defendant, “as untimely.” The court of appeal dismissed an appeal for lack of jurisdiction, stating that its independent research uncovered published authority—never cited in the opening brief submitted by counsel—holding that a section 1170(d)(1) ruling is a non-appealable order. A defense attorney has an obligation to disclose known authority holding the court has no jurisdiction to decide an appeal when the prosecution does not cite such authority. View "People v. Williams" on Justia Law

Flint was convicted of murder for his role in a 2006 attempted robbery in which his codefendant shot and killed Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department Deputy Rosa. The jury rejected a felony-murder special circumstance allegation.In 2018, Senate Bill 1437 restricted the application of the felony-murder doctrine. Previously, if a defendant committed one of certain serious felonies in which an accomplice killed someone, the defendant was liable for first-degree murder even if the killing was inadvertent and unforeseeable. Under S.B. 1437, to obtain a conviction for felony murder, the prosecution must prove the defendant was the actual killer, acted with the intent to kill in aiding, abetting, counseling, or soliciting the killing, or was “a major participant in the underlying felony and acted with reckless indifference to human life.” (Pen. Code 189(e)(3).), except where the victim is a peace officer who was killed while in the course of his duties, where the defendant knew or reasonably should have known that the victim was a peace officer engaged in the performance of his duties. The court of appeal reversed the denial of Flint’s petition for resentencing. Flint made a prima facie showing of entitlement to relief but is not entitled to automatic relief. The jurors unanimously believed the prosecution had failed to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Flint was a major participant who acted with reckless indifference to human life but the peace officer exception may preclude relief. View "People v. Flint" on Justia Law

Flores was convicted of several crimes, including felony corporal injury of his former girlfriend (Pen. Code 273.5(a).) The trial court sentenced Flores to 18 years and 8 months in prison, which included the upper term of imprisonment for his corporal injury conviction, a five-year enhancement for a prior felony conviction, and a one-year enhancement for a prior prison term. (sections 667(a), 667.5.) The court also imposed a $750.00 fee for preparing a PSR and a $108.19 booking fee.The court of appeal struck the one-year enhancement, vacated the balance of Flores’s fees, and otherwise affirmed. Assembly Bill 1869, eliminated a range of court-imposed fees. The court rejected Flores’s arguments that the trial court improperly admitted evidence of his prior acts of domestic violence. Although Senate Bill 1393 gave trial courts discretion to strike prior felony enhancements, the evidence in and the court’s comments indicate that the court would decline to exercise its discretion in striking the section 667(a) enhancement. Although Senate Bill 567 made the middle term of imprisonment the presumptive sentence, the court was “satisfied, beyond a reasonable doubt, the jury would have found true at least one aggravating circumstance” justifying Flores’s sentence. View "People v. Flores" on Justia Law

Defendant-appellant Elijah Hall was convicted by jury of six counts of robbery committed for the benefit of a criminal street gang and one count of active gang participation (all committed when he was 15 years old), and he received a sentence of 65 years to life in state prison. Hall appealed, and while his appeal was pending, Proposition 57 raised the minimum age a minor could be tried as an adult in criminal court from 14 to 16. Following the procedure approved in California v. Superior Court (Lara) 4 Cal.5th 299 (2018), the trial judge recalled Hall’s sentence and transferred his case to juvenile court, where the judge “treat[ed the] convictions as juvenile adjudications” and held a hearing to impose an appropriate disposition. After Hall was transferred to the Department of Juvenile Justice, he informed the Court of Appeal he wished to proceed with his appeal, which was reinstated as an appeal of a judgment in a juvenile criminal proceeding. Hall raised two challenges to the criminal trial on which his juvenile adjudications were based: (1) the trial judge violated his due process rights by instructing the jury with CALCRIM No. 315, which covered eyewitness identification evidence and tells the jury to consider, among other factors, the witness’s level of certainty when making the identification; and (2) Assembly Bill No. 333 (2021–2022 Reg. Sess.) required reversal of the true findings on the substantive gang offense and enhancements because the new law increased the proof requirements under the gang statute (Pen. Code 186.22). The Court of Appeal rejected Defendant's first argument under California v. Lemcke, 11 Cal.5th 644 (2021), in which the Supreme Court held that CALCRIM No. 315’s certainty factor did not violate due process. The Court agreed with Defendant's second argument, and remanded the case to give the State an opportunity to retry the substantive charge and enhancement allegations under Assembly Bill 333’s new requirements in a juvenile criminal proceeding, and impose a new disposition in Hall’s case - either at the conclusion of retrial or upon the State's election not to retry him. Judgment was affirmed in all other respects. View "California v. Hall" on Justia Law

J.B. and other minors happened upon the juvenile victim Joey, then shot and killed Joey, “in the context of gang activity.” They were not specifically looking for Joey. J.B. admitted to committing second-degree murder. Welfare and Institutions Code section 733(c) prohibits commitment to the Division of Juvenile Facilities (DJF) if “the most recent offense alleged in any petition and admitted or found to be true by the court is not described” in Welfare and Institutions Code Section 707(b) or Penal Code 290.008(c). The juvenile court dismissed two adjudicated petitions involving more recent non-707(b) offenses, pursuant to section 782, which allows a juvenile court to dismiss a petition “if the court finds that the interests of justice and the welfare of the person who is the subject of the petition require that dismissal,” or if it finds that he “is not in need of treatment or rehabilitation.”J.B. argued that the juvenile court lacked the authority to dismiss the adjudicated petitions for the sole purpose of committing him. The court of appeal affirmed. Section 733(c) did not bar the juvenile court from exercising its discretion under section 782 and dismissing the adjudicated petitions in the interests of justice and in J.B.’s welfare in order to commit him to DJF. View "In re J.B." on Justia Law

Smith served a prison term after pleading no contest to assault with intent to commit rape and admitting prior conviction and prison term allegations. Before his parole date, he was committed to Coalinga State Hospital as a sexually violent predator. Smith obtained conditional release under Welfare & Institutions Code section 6608 but was recommitted in 2017 based on violations of the program rules.His current release petition alleges that Smith’s diagnosis of “Other[] Specified” Paraphilia is invalid, he has no mental condition that justifies his commitment, he is no longer dangerous, he has serious medical problems, and he has undergone sex offender treatment and did not re-offend during the 18 months he spent in the community on conditional release. In a new annual report, a forensic psychologist concluded that neither conditional release nor unconditional discharge were appropriate because Smith continued to have a qualifying mental disorder and it was likely that Smith would continue to engage in sexually violent criminal behavior if released. The court of appeal reversed in part. The trial court erred in holding that his conditional release petition was frivolous. The court affirmed the denial of his petition for unconditional discharge under section 6605, rejecting an argument that the court erred in holding that he was required to obtain state authorization before filing the petition. View "People v. Smith" on Justia Law