1

Filed 11/6/23 P. v. Medrano CA2/4

NOT TO BE PUBLISHED IN THE OFFICIAL REPORTS

California Rules of Court, rule 8.1115(a), prohibits courts and parties from citing or relying on opinions not 

certified for publication or ordered published, except as specified by rule 8.1115(b). This opinion has not 

been certified for publication or ordered published for purposes of rule 8.1115.

IN THE COURT OF APPEAL OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA

SECOND APPELLATE DISTRICT

DIVISION FOUR

THE PEOPLE,

Plaintiff and Respondent,

v.

JUAN GILBERTO MEDRANO,

Defendant and Appellant.

 B322290

 (Los Angeles County

 Super. Ct. No. BA364189)

APPEAL from a judgment of the Superior Court of 

Los Angeles County, Charlaine F. Olmedo, Judge. Reversed and 

remanded, with directions.

Steven Schorr, under appointment by the Court of Appeal, for 

Defendant and Appellant.

Rob Bonta, Attorney General, Lance E. Winters, Chief 

Assistant Attorney General, Susan Sullivan Pithey, Senior 

Assistant Attorney General, Scott A. Taryle and Viet H. Nguyen, 

Deputy Attorneys General, for Plaintiff and Respondent. 

____________________________
2

Appellant Juan Gilberto Medrano appeals from the denial, at

the prima facie stage of review, of a post-conviction petition for

resentencing pursuant to Penal Code section 1172.6 (former section 

1170.95).1 He stands convicted of two counts of murder. The

killings occurred during a fight that broke out between appellant 

and his friend, Salvador Ayala, on one side, and Ayala’s neighbors, 

Javier Mejia and Raul Deras, on the other. By the time the 

altercation ended, both Mejia and Ayala were dead. Appellant was 

convicted of second degree murder of both men and of assault by 

means likely to produce great bodily injury as to Deras.

On appeal, appellant argues and respondent concedes the 

trial court erred in summarily denying section 1172.6 relief because 

jury instructions on an uncharged conspiracy allowed the jury to 

convict appellant of both murders based on the natural and 

probable consequences doctrine. We accept respondent’s concession 

and accordingly reverse and remand for further proceedings in the 

trial court.

BACKGROUND

In 2012, a jury convicted appellant of second degree murder 

(§ 187), involving victims Mejia and Ayala, and also found appellant 

guilty of assault by means likely to cause great bodily injury (§ 245)

against victim Deras. The jury found not true allegations that 

appellant personally used a knife (§ 12022, subd. (b)(1)) and 

committed multiple murders within the meaning of section 190.2, 

subdivision (a)(3). The trial court sentenced appellant to an 

1 Effective June 30, 2022, Penal Code section 1170.95 was 

renumbered section 1172.6, with no change in text. (Stats. 2022, ch. 58, 

§ 10). We hereafter cite to section 1172.6 for ease of reference. 

Undesignated statutory references are to the Penal Code.
3

aggregate term of 33 years to life. In 2014, this court affirmed 

appellant’s convictions on direct appeal. (People v. Medrano (Aug. 

21, 2014, B247087) [nonpub. opn.].) 

In July 2020, appellant filed a petition for resentencing under 

section 1172.6. The trial court appointed counsel to represent 

appellant and set a prima facie hearing. 

On June 28, 2022, the trial court found appellant failed to 

state a prima facie case for relief and denied the petition. The court 

determined appellant was not entitled to relief because the jury was 

not instructed on either felony murder2 or the natural and probable 

consequences doctrine. The court acknowledged there was 

“language concerning natural and probable consequences” in the 

conspiracy instruction, CALCRIM [No.] 416, and in the implied 

malice instruction, CALCRIM [No.] 520, but concluded the use of 

this language “doesn’t necessarily mean the doctrine itself is 

involved.”

Appellant timely appealed.

DISCUSSION

A. Section 1172.6

Senate Bill No. 1437 (2017–2018 Reg. Sess.) (SB 1437) limited 

accomplice liability under the felony-murder rule and eliminated 

the natural and probable consequences doctrine as it relates to 

murder to ensure that a person’s sentence is commensurate with 

his or her individual criminal culpability. (Stats. 2018, ch. 1015, 

§ 1, subd. (f); People v. Gentile (2020) 10 Cal.5th 830, 842–843 

(Gentile); see also People v. Lewis (2021) 11 Cal.5th 952, 957, 971 

(Lewis).) To that end, and as relevant here, SB 1437 amended 

2 The parties agree the prosecution did not pursue a felony murder 

theory in this case. 
4

section 188, subdivision (a)(3) to require that all principals to 

murder must act with express or implied malice. (Stats. 2018, 

ch. 1015, §§ 1, 188, subd. (a)(3) [“[m]alice shall not be imputed to a 

person based solely on his or her participation in a crime”]; Gentile, 

supra, 10 Cal.5th at pp. 842–843, 851.)

SB 1437 also added section 1172.6, providing a procedure for 

defendants whose cases are final to seek retroactive relief by 

petitioning the sentencing court to vacate the conviction and 

resentence on any remaining counts. (§ 1172.6, subd. (a).) 

Section 1172.6, subdivisions (b)(3) and (c) require the court to 

appoint counsel for all properly pleaded petitions and then conduct 

a prima facie analysis, with briefing by the parties, as to the 

petitioner’s eligibility before determining whether to issue an order 

to show cause at a later evidentiary hearing. (§ 1172.6, 

subds. (b)(3), (c); Lewis, supra, 11 Cal.5th at pp. 961–970.)

“In reviewing any part of the record of conviction at this 

preliminary juncture, a trial court should not engage in ‘factfinding

involving the weighing of evidence or the exercise of discretion.’” 

(People v. Lewis, supra, 11 Cal.5th at p. 972, internal citation 

omitted.) “Rather, it should decide such issues only after issuing an 

order to show cause and holding an evidentiary hearing.” (People v. 

Duchine (2021) 60 Cal.App.5th 798, 811.)

B. Jury Instructions Given at Trial

At appellant’s trial, the jury was instructed on various

theories of murder liability.

3 Under one theory, the jury could find 

appellant guilty of the murders if he joined in a conspiracy to 

3 As indicated in subsection C, post, the record does not establish the 

jury necessarily based its verdicts on any instructions or theory other 

than the uncharged conspiracy instruction. 
5

commit assault with a deadly weapon and murder was a natural 

and probable consequence of that target crime. In other words, 

appellant could be found guilty of the murders if they were the 

natural and probable consequences of an assault with a deadly 

weapon committed by a coconspirator. The relevant jury 

instructions, CALCRIM No. 417 and CALJIC No. 417, as given, 

stated:

“417. A member of a conspiracy is criminally

responsible for the crimes he or she conspires to commit

no matter which member of the conspiracy commits the

crime.

A member of the conspiracy is also criminally

responsible for any act of any member of the conspiracy 

if that act is done to further the conspiracy and that act 

is a natural and probable consequence of the common 

plan or design of the conspiracy.

This rule applies even if the act was not intended

as part of the original plan. 

A natural and probable consequence is one that a

reasonable person would know is likely to happen if

nothing unusual intervenes. In deciding whether a

consequence is natural and probable, consider all the

circumstances established by the evidence.

A member of a conspiracy is not criminally responsible 

for the act of another member if that act does not further 
6

the common plan or is not a natural and probable 

consequence of the common plan.

To prove that the defendant is guilty of the crimes

charge in counts [one] and [two] [the murder charges], 

the People must prove that number 1, the defendant 

conspired to commit one of the following crimes: 

Assault with a deadly or dangerous weapon.

Number 2. A member of the conspiracy committed 

assault, assault with a deadly or dangerous weapon to 

further the conspiracy.

Number 3. Murder was a natural and probable 

consequence of the common plan or design of the crime 

that the defendant conspired to commit.”

4

C. Summary Denial of Appellant’s Section 1172.6 

Petition Was Reversible Error

The trial court erred in denying the petition at the prima facie 

stage. Although the jury was not instructed on the natural and 

probable consequences doctrine as it applied to a theory of aiding 

and abetting, it was instructed on that same theory as applied to 

another theory of vicarious liability, conspiracy. And while the 

People argued below, citing Gentile, supra, 10 Cal.5th at p. 844, 

that conspiracy to commit murder remains a valid theory upon 

4 We previously granted appellant’s motion to judicially notice pages 

576 through 614 and 698 through 701 of volume 5 of the reporter’s 

transcript in Appeal No. 247087. 
7

which a murder conviction may be based, the jury instructions here 

were not so limited. Instead, the instructions allowed the jury to 

impute malice for both murders based on appellant’s participation 

in an uncharged conspiracy to commit an assault with a deadly 

weapon. (Compare People v. Offley (2020) 48 Cal.App.5th 588, 599 

[trial court erred in summarily denying resentencing relief where 

jury was instructed on natural and probable consequences doctrine 

as part of its instruction on conspiracy liability; jury could have 

found appellant conspired only to commit assault of which a natural 

consequence was murder] with People v. Beck & Cruz (2019) 8 

Cal.5th 548, 645 [“Beck and Cruz were charged with conspiracy to 

murder, not conspiracy to commit a lesser crime that resulted in 

murder. There is thus no possibility they were found guilty of 

murder on a natural and probable consequences theory”], original 

italics.)

Moreover, nothing in the verdicts indicate the jury did not 

rely on CALCRIM No. 417 but instead on a still-valid theory of 

murder. The instructions offered the jurors multiple theories and 

plainly told them they did not have to agree on any one theory: 

“Where the evidence shows only a single discrete crime [was 

committed] but leaves room for disagreement as to exactly how the 

crime was committed or what the defendant’s precise role was, you 

need not unanimously agree on the basis or theory whereby the 

defendant is guilty.” The jury found appellant not guilty of first 

degree murder, but guilty of second degree murder. In addition, the 

jury found not true the allegations that appellant personally used a 

knife. Thus, the record of conviction was insufficient to show that 

appellant was ineligible for section 1172.6 relief as a matter of law. 

(See Lewis, supra, 11 Cal.5th at pp. 970–972; see also People v. 

Langi (2022) 73 Cal.App.5th 972, 984.)
8

In briefing below, the People argued the section 1172.6 

petition should be denied because there was “ample evidence” to 

support appellant’s murder convictions under any of the alternate 

theories presented. As acknowledged by respondent, however, this 

is not a basis from which to conclude the section 1172.6 petition 

fails as a matter of law at the prima facie stage of review. Rather, 

an order to show cause must issue to allow the parties to present 

and the trial court to consider the evidence. 

DISPOSITION

The order denying appellant’s resentencing petition is 

reversed. The matter is remanded to the trial court with directions 

to issue an order to show cause and conduct an evidentiary hearing 

in accordance with section 1172.6, subdivision (d). 

MORI, J.

We concur:

CURREY, P. J.

ZUKIN, J.