Case Title: P. v. Johnson

Citation: 

Docket Number: S097755

State: california

Court: California Supreme Court

Date: 2002-08-19T00:00:00Z

Document:
1 
Filed 8/19/02 
 
 
 
IN THE SUPREME COURT OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 
 
THE PEOPLE, 
) 
 
 
) 
 
Plaintiff and Respondent, 
) 
 
 
) 
S097755 
 
v. 
) 
 
 
) 
Ct.App. 1/4 A091500 
DALE HOWARD JOHNSON, 
) 
 
) 
Sonoma County 
 
Defendant and Appellant. 
) 
Super. Ct. No. SCP29023 
___________________________________ ) 
 
 
Penal Code section 2900.5 provides that the total number of days a 
defendant spends in custody, either before sentencing or as a condition of 
probation, “shall be credited” against the defendant’s “term of imprisonment.”  In 
this case, we resolve two issues regarding that statute:  First, we conclude that a 
defendant can expressly waive entitlement to credits for time served.  Second, we 
hold that such an express waiver is proper and enforceable when a trial court in 
sentencing a defendant to a maximum term of imprisonment conditions a grant of 
probation upon the defendant’s waiver of custody credits.   
I.  FACTS 
 
Defendant was charged with two counts of burglary and one count of 
receiving stolen property.  Under a plea bargain, defendant entered a plea of no 
 
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contest to one count of residential burglary (Pen. Code, §§ 459/460)1 in return for 
dismissal of the other charges.  
 
Because the burglary involved “significant planning” by defendant, who 
had copied a house key entrusted to the cleaning business where he worked, and 
because the value of the items taken exceeded $12,000, the trial court found that 
aggravating factors predominated and sentenced defendant to the upper term of six 
years in state prison.  (See § 461, subd. (1).)  The trial court further found that 
defendant, who was then 24 years old and had a drug problem but no prior felony 
convictions, would benefit from probation.  The court suspended execution of 
sentence and placed defendant on probation for 36 months.  The court conditioned 
its grant of probation upon defendant’s agreement to (1) incarceration in county 
jail until space became available at Turning Point, a residential drug treatment 
facility, and (2) giving up entitlement to section 2900.5 custody credits, that is, the 
credits defendant would otherwise receive for the time served in county jail 
(before and after sentencing) and at Turning Point, in the event defendant were to 
violate probation and be sent to state prison.   
 
The trial court told defendant:  “You make the choices.  If you choose to 
work hard in the program and get something out of it and stay off drugs, you will 
never have to come back in here, and you’re not going to have a problem.  If you 
don’t do that, you will come back in here, and you are going to go to prison.  So 
use a six-year [state prison] sentence as a motivating tool to help you make the 
right choice when you are faced with choices.  I am going to give you the 
opportunity.”   
                                             
 
1  
Further undesignated statutory references are to the Penal Code. 
 
3 
 
Although defendant expressly agreed to a waiver of custody credits, his 
attorney, presumably to preserve the issue for appeal, “technically object[ed]” for 
the record.  On appeal, defendant argued that the waiver of custody credits was not 
enforceable because the trial court had imposed the maximum term of 
imprisonment and thus if defendant violated probation and was sent to state 
prison, his total time in custody would exceed that allowed by law.  The Court of 
Appeal affirmed the trial court, and we granted defendant’s petition for review. 
II.  DISCUSSION 
 
Under section 2900.5, a defendant sentenced either to county jail or to state 
prison is entitled to credit against the term of imprisonment for days spent in 
custody before sentencing as well as those served after sentencing as a condition 
of probation.  (In re Rojas (1979) 23 Cal.3d 152, 156; accord, People v. Bruner 
(1995) 9 Cal.4th 1178.)  This provision also applies to custodial time in a 
residential treatment facility.  (§ 2900.5.)2   
 
Nearly 25 years ago, Justice Bernard Jefferson’s concurrence in In re 
Chamberlain (1978) 78 Cal.App.3d 712, 720 (Chamberlain) pointed out that 
nothing in the language of section 2900.5 prohibited a defendant from knowingly 
and intelligently waiving entitlement to custody credits.   
                                             
 
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Subdivision (a) of section 2900.5 provides:  “In all felony and misdemeanor 
convictions, either by plea or by verdict, when the defendant has been in custody, 
including, but not limited to, any time spent in a jail, camp, work furlough facility, 
halfway house, rehabilitation facility, hospital, prison, juvenile detention facility, 
or similar residential institution, all days of custody of the defendant, including 
days served as a condition of probation . . . shall be credited upon his or her term 
of imprisonment . . . .  If the total number of days in custody exceeds the number 
of days of the term of imprisonment to be imposed, the entire term of 
imprisonment shall be deemed to have been served.”   
 
4 
 
In Chamberlain, the trial court suspended a state prison sentence and placed 
the defendant on probation conditioned upon service of one year in county jail 
with no credit for the days the defendant had already spent in jail before 
sentencing.  In a petition for habeas corpus filed in the Court of Appeal, the 
defendant unsuccessfully challenged that order.  In a concurring opinion, Justice 
Jefferson agreed with the majority’s denial of relief, but he did so for the 
following reason:  By accepting probation, the defendant had waived his right to 
custody credits under section 2900.5, and he had done so knowingly and 
intelligently.  But absent such a waiver, Justice Jefferson explained, any period of 
incarceration without credits would be an illegal sentence under former section 
19a (now § 19.2), which “places a one-year limit upon a county jail commitment 
given as a condition of probation.”  (Chamberlain, supra, 78 Cal.App.3d at pp. 
720-721 (conc. opn. of Jefferson, J.).) 
 
Agreeing with that view, the Court of Appeal in People v. Johnson (1978) 
82 Cal.App.3d 183, 188 (Johnson) held that section 2900.5 permits a defendant to 
“knowingly and intelligently waive” the right to receive credit for “all days of 
custody [to] be credited to [the defendant’s] sentence, including any period of 
imprisonment as a condition of probation.”  The court described its holding as a 
“realistic interpretation” of section 2900.5, which allows a trial judge in a “proper 
case,” acting with the defendant’s consent, “[to] formulate a sentence which fits 
the crime and the criminal.”  (Johnson, supra, at p. 188.)  The court also noted that 
when a defendant violates probation after spending one year in county jail as a 
condition of probation, its holding would mean that the sentencing judge would 
not have to “choose between ignoring the violation or imposing sentence to state 
prison.”  (Ibid.)  Rather, the judge could “fashion an intermediate disposition by 
modifying probation” to provide for additional time in county jail.  (Ibid.)   
 
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Since then, Courts of Appeal, in upholding custody credits waivers in a 
wide variety of circumstances, have not questioned that a defendant may waive 
entitlement to such credits under section 2900.5.  (See People v. Torres (1997) 52 
Cal.App.4th 771, 775 [waiver at sentencing of future credits for probationary term 
in drug treatment program]; People v. Salazar (1994) 29 Cal.App.4th 1550, 1553-
1556 [waiver at reinstatement of probation of past custody credits]; People v. 
Ambrose (1992) 7 Cal.App.4th 1917, 1920, 1925 [waiver at reinstatement of 
probation of past and future credits]; People v. Zuniga (1980) 108 Cal.App.3d 739, 
743 [waiver at sentencing of past custody credits].)  In People v. Tran (2000) 78 
Cal.App.4th 383 (Tran), which we address later in this opinion, the Court of 
Appeal set aside a waiver of custody credits by a defendant sentenced to a 
suspended maximum term in state prison, but the court still acknowledged that 
defendants could waive custody credits in situations not involving a suspended 
sentence for the maximum term.   
 
Like the Courts of Appeal that have addressed the issue, we too conclude 
that a defendant may expressly waive entitlement to section 2900.5 credits against 
an ultimate jail or prison sentence for past and future days in custody.  As the 
United States Supreme Court has observed, “ ‘[t]he most basic rights of criminal 
defendants are . . . subject to waiver.’ ”  (United States v. Mezzanatto (1995) 513 
U.S. 196, 201.)  This is consistent with the well-established rule allowing “ ‘[a] 
party [to] waive any provision . . . intended for his benefit.’ ”  (Ibid; accord, Civ. 
Code, § 3513; People v. Cowen (1996) 14 Cal.4th 367, 371.)  As with the waiver 
of any significant right by a criminal defendant, a defendant’s waiver of 
entitlement to section 2900.5 custody credits must, of course, be knowing and 
intelligent.  (People v. Harris (1987) 195 Cal.App.3d 717, 725.)  Because a 
defendant may give up the statutory right to custody credits, a trial court has 
 
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discretion to condition a grant or extension of probation upon a defendant’s 
express waiver of past and future custody credits.3   
 
Defendant acknowledges that trial courts generally have authority to 
condition probation upon a waiver of credits for time in custody.  But he contends 
that in this case the trial court exceeded that authority because, after imposing the 
maximum prison term for burglary (six years), it required, as a condition of 
granting probation, that defendant give up entitlement to custody credits both for 
time in county jail and at Turning Point, the drug treatment facility.  As a 
consequence, defendant points out, were he to violate probation, he would face the 
full six-year prison term with no reduction for time spent in county jail or at 
Turning Point, resulting in a total time in custody in excess of the maximum state 
prison term for the offense.   
 
In support, defendant relies on People v. Ambrose, supra, 7 Cal.App.4th 
1917 (Ambrose).  That reliance is misplaced, however.   
 
In Ambrose, the Court of Appeal upheld the trial court’s requirement, 
imposed as a condition of probation, that the defendant waive future custody 
credits for time spent at Diablo Valley Ranch, an alcohol treatment facility.  As in 
this case, the defendant in Ambrose was sentenced to the upper term, execution of 
which was suspended.  In upholding the defendant’s waiver of custody credits, the 
Court of Appeal in Ambrose observed:  “This does not mean, of course, that we 
would endorse a situation in which the denial of future credits enabled the court to 
                                             
 
3   
We do not here consider whether a trial court could within the proper 
exercise of its discretion routinely condition grants of probation upon waivers of 
credit for time served.  (Compare People v. Penoli (1996) 46 Cal.App.4th 298, 
303-304 [abuse of discretion for trial court as a “standard practice” to require 
custody credit waivers for time in drug rehabilitation programs] with People v. 
Torres, supra, 52 Cal.App.4th 771, 775-783 [disagreeing with People v. Penoli].)   
 
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impose a term which is longer than the maximum allowable for the offense.  Even 
if a defendant agrees to such a negotiated disposition, a trial court should not 
impose a sentence in excess of the maximum allowable for the plea entered.  
Appellant would be entitled to discharge from custody at the ranch if and when 
his total custodial time, including time at the ranch, equaled the maximum 
incarceration period.”  (Ambrose, supra, 7 Cal.App.4th at p. 1924, italics added.)   
 
That comment by the Ambrose court envisioned a situation in which a trial 
court, as a condition of probation, has imposed an indefinite custodial term in a 
residential treatment program.  Ambrose suggests that when the total time the 
defendant spends in county jail and in the residential program equals the crime’s 
maximum sentence, the defendant must be discharged from the program.  But 
Ambrose did not address the issue here:  whether imposition of a suspended 
maximum prison term precludes the trial court from requiring, as a condition of 
probation, that the defendant waive entitlement to section 2900.5 custody credits.  
Thus, it is not authority for defendant’s contention here.   
 
Invoking the rule that probation conditions must serve some legitimate 
purpose relating to the offender or the offense (see People v. Carbajal (1995) 10 
Cal.4th 1114, 1121; People v. Lent (1975) 15 Cal.3d 481, 486), defendant asserts 
that the only purpose served by conditioning his probation upon a waiver of past 
and future custody credits was an illegitimate one -- exposing him to the 
possibility of serving more than six years in custody for an offense with a six-year 
maximum sentence.  We disagree.   
 
Here, after accepting defendant’s waiver of custody credits, the trial court 
placed him on probation for 36 months conditioned upon successful completion of 
the Turning Point residential drug treatment program.  As noted in Ambrose, 
supra, 7 Cal.App.4th at page 1925, when probation is conditioned upon 
completion of a residential treatment program, custody credit waivers ensure the 
 
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defendant’s “optimum chances of success in [the] treatment program, while 
reserving an appropriate sentence if, despite the opportunity received, the 
treatment program and probation are not completed.”  Here, the trial court required 
defendant’s waiver not just of credits for time spent at the Turning Point treatment 
program but also for time spent in county jail, both before sentencing and while 
awaiting placement in the program.  The waiver was to give defendant an 
incentive to successfully complete the residential treatment program based on the 
knowledge that failure to do so would expose him to imposition of the six-year 
prison sentence unreduced by previously served custodial time.  Here, defendant, 
who admittedly suffers from drug dependency, committed a serious residential 
burglary warranting maximum punishment, but the trial court’s grant of probation 
gave him a chance to get off drugs and to avoid state prison.  On these facts, we 
cannot say that the trial court’s requirement of a waiver of custody credits as a 
condition of granting probation lacked any legitimate penal function.   
 
We now address the Court of Appeal’s decision in Tran, supra, 78 
Cal.App.4th 383, which held that waivers of custody credits are improper when a 
trial court suspends a maximum state prison sentence.  We find Tran’s reasoning 
unpersuasive.   
 
In Tran, the defendant deposited bad checks in three bank accounts and 
then withdrew $40,000 to cover gambling debts.  He later pleaded guilty to three 
counts of grand theft.  The trial court imposed the maximum prison sentence, 
suspended its execution, and placed the defendant on five years’ probation 
conditioned upon an 18-month county jail term, a waiver of future custody credits, 
and restitution to the banks of the full $40,000.  Under protest, the defendant 
agreed to waive entitlement to credit for days in custody.  On appeal, he 
challenged that aspect of the trial court’s sentencing order as unauthorized, 
arguing that if he violated probation and was sent to state prison with no credit for 
 
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the 18-month jail term, his total custodial time would exceed the maximum prison 
term.  The Court of Appeal agreed.  (Tran, supra, 78 Cal.App.4th 383, 385-390.) 
 
We disagree with Tran, supra, 78 Cal.App.4th 383, that a trial court, after 
imposing and suspending a state prison sentence for the maximum term allowed 
by law, may never condition a grant of probation on a waiver of the custody 
credits authorized by section 2900.5.  In general, defendants may waive provisions 
that are intended for their benefit, and the provision of section 2900.5 allowing 
defendants to receive credits against an eventual sentence for time spent in custody 
before sentencing or while on probation is intended to benefit defendants, as we 
explained on page 5, ante.4   
 
Exercising its discretion, the trial court determined that imposing the 
maximum term for defendant’s crime of residential burglary and conditioning 
probation on a waiver of section 2900.5 custody credits was necessary to provide 
defendant with sufficient incentive to comply with the other terms of probation 
and to successfully complete the rehabilitation program.  Defendant makes no 
claim that, as a result of the waiver condition, the total time he will be required to 
spend in custody before sentencing and as a condition of probation will exceed the 
maximum term statutorily authorized for the crime he committed.  Under these 
circumstances, we conclude that defendant has failed to show that the custody 
credit waiver condition was invalid, and we further conclude that the state prison 
sentence the trial court imposed, for the maximum term authorized by law, was a 
valid sentence and was not rendered unlawful by defendant’s waiver of custody 
credits.   
                                             
 
4   
We disapprove Tran, supra, 78 Cal.App.4th 383, to the extent it is 
inconsistent with our conclusion here.   
 
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DISPOSITION 
 
We affirm the judgment of the Court of Appeal.   
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
KENNARD, J. 
 
WE CONCUR: 
 
GEORGE, C.J. 
BAXTER, J. 
WERDEGAR, J. 
CHIN, J. 
BROWN, J. 
MORENO, J. 
 
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See next page for addresses and telephone numbers for counsel who argued in Supreme Court. 
 
Name of Opinion People v. Johnson (Dale) 
__________________________________________________________________________________ 
 
Unpublished Opinion 
Original Appeal 
Original Proceeding 
Review Granted XXX 88 Cal.App.4th 420 
Rehearing Granted 
 
__________________________________________________________________________________ 
 
Opinion No. S097755 
Date Filed: August 19, 2002 
__________________________________________________________________________________ 
 
Court: Superior 
County: Sonoma 
Judge: Robert S. Boyd 
 
__________________________________________________________________________________ 
 
Attorneys for Appellant: 
 
Gordon B. Scott, under appointment by the Supreme Court, for Defendant and Appellant. 
 
 
 
 
 
__________________________________________________________________________________ 
 
Attorneys for  Respondent: 
 
Bill Lockyer, Attorney General, David P. Druliner and Robert R. Anderson, Chief Assistant Attorneys 
General, Ronald A. Bass, Assistant Attorney General, Laurence K. Sullivan and Seth K. Schalit, Deputy 
Attorneys General, for Plaintiff and Respondent. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
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Counsel who argued in Supreme Court (not intended for publication with opinion): 
 
Gordon B. Scott 
350 E Street, Suite 220 
Santa Rosa, CA  95404 
(707) 523-4400 
 
Seth K. Schalit 
Deputy Attorney General 
455 Golden Gate Avenue, Suite 11000 
San Francisco, CA  94102-7004 
(415) 703-1371