Justia Constitutional Law Opinion Summaries

While walking one evening in San Diego's College Area, Defendants Lula Sophia Gong Cotsirilos and Tess Elisabet Edman were stopped and cited for underage possession of alcohol in a public place. Although the State filed no written opposition and made no appearance at the suppression hearing, they did subpoena the two investigating officers. Rather than take evidence, the superior court granted the suppression motions based solely on the State's failure to respond or appear. The appellate division of the superior court agreed, concluding that while no written opposition was required, the State's failure to respond or appear compelled suppression. The Court of Appeal concluded that in the ordinary infraction case, the prosecution was not required to oppose a motion to suppress by filing an opposition brief or appearing at the suppression hearing. Instead, it could meet its burden to provide justification for a warrantless search by subpoenaing relevant law enforcement witnesses, who could in turn provide narrative testimony to the court in the same manner as would be permitted in the prosecution's absence at an infraction trial. Because the superior court concluded the prosecution's nonappearance in and of itself compelled suppression, the Court of Appeal reversed and remanded for a new hearing on the motions to suppress. View "California v. Cotsirilos" on Justia Law

The attempted replacement of a fence led defendant Yi Chih Chen to threaten his neighbors with a shotgun. Following a jury trial, defendant was acquitted on felony charges but convicted on a misdemeanor brandishing charge and sentenced to 36 months of summary probation. At trial, his position was that he acted in defense of property. The Court of Appeal affirmed, finding that displays of deadly force were an unreasonable means of defending property where there is no home invasion or threat of death or serious bodily harm. View "California v. Chen" on Justia Law

Petitioner Bill Sandlin filed a petition for mandamus relief to challenge the candidate statements submitted by Real Parties in Interest Ed Pope, Jaci Woods, and Frank McGill (Real Parties) in their candidacy for positions on the Irvine City Council. Petitioner alleged Real Parties’ candidate statements would mislead voters about the current city council’s actions and the facts concerning a failed referendum to relocate the site of a planned state veterans cemetery. Real Parties opposed the petition and filed a special motion to strike under the anti-SLAPP statute. While Real Parties’ anti-SLAPP motion was pending, the trial court denied the mandamus petition in its entirety, finding Petitioner’s challenge to Pope’s candidate statement was untimely, and finding he failed to establish Woods’s or McGill’s candidate statements were false, misleading, or otherwise barred by the Elections Code. The court then denied Real Parties’ anti-SLAPP motion as moot, and further found it was barred by the public interest litigation exemption to the anti-SLAPP statute. After reviewing their anti-SLAPP motion de novo, the Court of Appeal concluded the motion was not moot, the public interest litigation exemption was inapplicable, and the motion should have been granted. View "Sandlin v. McLaughlin" on Justia Law

Defendant Jessie Reneaux was convicted by jury of inflicting corporal injury on his girlfriend, L.E., with whom he was cohabiting, guilty of false imprisonment of his girlfriend, and guilty of dissuading his girlfriend from testifying against him. He appealed, arguing: (1) the trial court violated his right to confront witnesses against him by allowing the girlfriend’s out of court testimonial statements to be admitted into evidence; and, (2) the trial court abused its discretion when it imposed consecutive rather than concurrent terms. In supplemental briefing, defendant contended that in light of the recent passage of Senate Bill No. 1393 (SB 1393), this matter should have been remanded to permit the trial court to consider whether it should exercise its newly-legislated discretion to strike or dismiss the prior serious felony conviction enhancements imposed under Penal Code section 667(a). To this, the State agreed. The Court of Appeal concluded defendant forfeited, by his own wrongdoing, his Sixth Amendment right to confront and cross-examine L.E., and the trial court did not abuse its discretion in sentencing defendant to consecutive prison terms. The Court therefore affirmed judgment of conviction, but remanded to the trial court for the limited purpose of allowing the trial court to exercise its sentencing discretion under Penal Code sections 1385 and 667(a) to strike or dismiss the prior serious felony conviction enhancements. View "California v. Reneaux" on Justia Law

The State of California, represented by the San Diego County District Attorney, appealed the dismissal of all criminal charges against defendants Mario Aguilera, Jesus Castaneda, Ricardo Eaton, Daniel Gracia, William Sherman, and Jose Villanueva. Defendants were charged with multiple felonies, including robbery and carjacking arising from an aborted illegal drug transaction. The trial court found that defendants' constitutional right to due process was violated because the federal government refused defendants' requests to produce potentially exculpatory evidence in the possession of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA). After review, the Court of Appeal concluded that neither due process nor any other constitutional provision required dismissal of the charges against defendants under the circumstances here. The dismissal order was therefore reversed. View "California v. Aguilera" on Justia Law

After the verdict in this case, a juror asserted that during the trial he had been visited at home by a man who purported to be the brother of one of the defendants, causing the juror to be scared. The trial court denied a new trial motion brought by defendants-appellants Anthony Albert and Noah Roosevelt Davis due to that incident, leaving in place their convictions of first degree murder and gang participation. In the published portion of this opinion, the Court of Appeal rejected defendants’ claim that the Court should have presumed the juror had a bias that violated the defendants’ constitutional rights, thus affirming the convictions. In the unpublished portion of this opinion, the Court modified the judgment to correct certain sentencing errors, ordered the correction of clerical error in defendants’ abstract of judgment, reversed the orders imposing a $10,000 criminal restitution fine on each defendant, and remanded for a hearing on defendants’ ability to pay the fines. View "California v. Albert" on Justia Law

After filing unsuccessful petitions for writ of mandate challenging the approval of two of the projects under various land use laws, AFH filed suit against the City for violating the federal Fair Housing Act (FHA) and the state Fair Employment and Housing Act (FEHA) based on a disparate-impact theory of liability.The Court of Appeal held that the trial court correctly found AHF cannot assert a cause of action under the FHA and FEHA based on its alleged disparate-impact theory of liability where AHF has not alleged a policy that is an artificial, arbitrary, and unnecessary barrier to fair housing. In this case, AHF has not alleged that the City's policy restricts affordable housing; the City's approval of the Projects does not eliminate housing; and AHF seeks to impose a new development policy on the City, rather than to eliminate one. The court also held that the trial court did not abuse its discretion by denying AHF leave to amend. Accordingly, the court affirmed the trial court's decision sustaining the City's and Real Parties' demurrers. View "AIDS Healthcare Foundation v. City of Los Angeles" on Justia Law

On appeal, Defendant Dammar Johnson challenged the trial court’s denial of his renewed motion to suppress. He was parked on the side of a road when two police officers approached to investigate his car’s missing registration tag. Defendant ended up handcuffed in the patrol car for resisting an officer. After defendant was detained, one of the officers performed what was described as a tow inventory search. The officer smelled marijuana emanating from the car and found “[p]ossibly a couple grams” of marijuana in the center console; the search then purportedly transitioned from an inventory search into a probable cause search, which revealed a loaded handgun in the rear cargo area of the car. Defendant sought to suppress the evidence from the search, but the motion and his renewed motion were denied. The magistrate and trial judge found the search was not an inventory search, but upheld it based on probable cause. Defendant pled no contest to being a felon in possession of a firearm. The issue this case presented for the Court of Appeal's review was whether the odor of marijuana and visual observation of approximately two grams of marijuana in a plastic baggie knotted at the top in defendant’s parked car provided probable cause to justify the search conducted by the officers. The Court concluded the officers did not have probable cause, and therefore reversed. View "California v. Johnson" on Justia Law

In 2008, defendant-appellant Adrian Federico pled guilty to assault with a firearm. He admitted he personally used the firearm in the commission of the offense, personally inflicted great bodily injury, and committed the offense for the benefit of a street gang. The trial court sentenced him to a total term of 20 years in state prison. Ten years later, the superior court received a letter from the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR), recommending that the court recall and resentence defendant under section 1170(d), stating the court should not have imposed both a GBI and gang enhancement in light of California v. Gonzalez, 178 Cal.App.4th 1325 (2009). Defendant thereafter moved the court to apply Proposition 57 and transfer jurisdiction to the juvenile court (he was 15 years old at the time of the offense). The trial court declined to apply Proposition 57, since defendant’s judgment was final long before Proposition 57 took effect. However, the court concluded it would provide him with Gonzalez relief by resentencing him to 17 years in state prison, consisting of four years on count 1, plus three years on the GBI enhancement, and 10 years on the personal firearm enhancement. The court imposed but stayed the 10-year gang enhancement under Penal Code section 654. On appeal, defendant argued the trial court erred in denying his request to apply Proposition 57 and/or Senate Bill No. 1391 (2017-2018 Reg. Sess.) and remand the matter to the juvenile court. Finding no reversible error, however, the Court of Appeal affirmed. View "California v. Federico" on Justia Law

Michael Hughes was charged with three counts of murder, among other charges, on the theory he knew the risk of driving while intoxicated but drove anyway. He hit another vehicle whose driver failed to yield to him; three people in the car he hit died from their injuries. Hughes had been previously convicted of driving under the influence and had been drinking on the night of the accident. The critical issue at trial was whether Hughes’s drinking was a substantial factor in causing the accident. The police and highway patrol both concluded the deceased driver was the primary cause of the accident, and their testimony suggested Hughes’s speed and drinking may have played a role, but that the physical evidence suggested he was not driving at an unsafe speed and he responded appropriately in attempting to avoid the collision. After the jury heard that testimony, however, the prosecution called as an expert witness a second member of the highway patrol team which investigated the accident. The expert disagreed with his colleagues and offered new expert testimony not previously disclosed to the defense in violation of the criminal discovery statutes. Though defense counsel objected to this testimony in a timely fashion, the trial court allowed the prosecution to proceed with the questioning, and the defense had to cross-examine the expert without an opportunity to prepare adequately. The trial court ultimately denied Hughes' motion for a mistrial and attempted to remedy the discovery violation with a curative instruction to the jury. In the end, the expert’s new testimony on causation was uncontradicted, the jury convicted Hughes of three counts of murder, and the trial court sentenced him to three consecutive 15-year-to- life terms. After review, the Court of Appeal concluded the trial court abused its discretion in failing to grant the mistrial: "The trial court had the opportunity to salvage the trial by continuing it and allowing the defense to locate, prepare, and seek the assistance of an expert to rebut the surprise expert causation testimony when the defense first objected. By failing to do so and allowing the prosecution to proceed in its questioning of the expert, the trial court contributed to a situation with no adequate remedy but a mistrial." View "California v. Hughes" on Justia Law