Filed 10/6/15 P. v. Gonzalez CA2/8

NOT TO BE PUBLISHED IN THE OFFICIAL REPORTS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 

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IN THE COURT OF APPEAL OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA

SECOND APPELLATE DISTRICT

DIVISION EIGHT

THE PEOPLE,

Plaintiff and Respondent,

v.

ERIC GONZALEZ, JR.,

Defendant and Appellant.

 B260440

 (Los Angeles County

 Super. Ct. No. MA055652)

APPEAL from an order of the Superior Court of Los Angeles County. Daviann L. 

Mitchell, Judge. Affirmed.

Jared G. Coleman, under appointment by the Court of Appeal, for Defendant and 

Appellant.

Kamala D. Harris, Attorney General, Gerald A. Engler, Chief Assistant Attorney 

General, Lance E. Winters, Assistant Attorney General, Stephanie C. Brenan and Toni R. 

Johns Estaville, Deputy Attorneys General, for Plaintiff and Respondent.

__________________________
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Eric Gonzalez, Jr. (defendant) appeals from the order sentencing him to three 

years in county jail following revocation of his probation. His sole contention is that the 

trial court erred in basing its sentencing choice on defendant’s poor performance on 

probation, which was a circumstance that did not exist at the time probation was granted. 

We affirm.

FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND

A family argument led to defendant’s arrest in March 2012. In May 2012, he pled 

no contest to felony resisting arrest (Pen. Code, § 69). According to a probation report 

dated May 10, 2012, defendant had been the subject of a sustained Welfare and 

Institutions Code section 602 petition in October 2010, based on his possession of a 

weapon at school. As an adult, he was convicted of misdemeanor gun possession in 

August 2011. He was on probation in that case when he was arrested for possession of a 

controlled substance in February 2012. Defendant was still on probation in the gun 

possession case and the drug case was still pending when he engaged in the conduct 

underlying his conviction in this case. The probation department recommended the high 

term based on aggravating circumstances that included the number and increasing 

seriousness of defendant’s prior convictions and his unsatisfactory performance on 

probation. Notwithstanding the probation department’s recommendation, the trial court 

suspended imposition of sentence and placed defendant on three year’s probation. 

According to a probation report dated December 19, 2012, defendant was in 

violation of several conditions of his probation. The report states: “It appears that the 

defendant is not taking the court’s orders seriously and perhaps a suitable time in custody 

will be sufficient to alert the defendant that further non-compliance will not be tolerated.”

At a hearing in March 2013, defendant admitted violating probation. Finding defendant 

in violation of the conditions requiring him to report to his probation officer and to 

complete community labor and drug rehabilitation programs, the trial court revoked his 

probation. In exchange for a waiver of all “back-time” (i.e. pre-sentence custody credits), 
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the trial court reinstated defendant’s probation on the same terms as before, including the 

community labor and drug rehabilitation program conditions.

After defendant failed to meet with his probation officer, a bench warrant was 

issued. At the probation violation hearing on September 15, 2014, the trial court 

observed that the original probation report indicated defendant was on probation at the 

time he committed the offense in this case and that defendant’s prior unsatisfactory 

performance on probation in that case was among the listed aggravating factors. The 

matter was continued to October 6 and then to October 29, 2014, for a contested 

probation revocation hearing. At the hearing on October 6, the trial court noted that 

while on probation in this case, defendant was arrested for a weapons violation. 

Following the hearing on October 29, 2014, the trial court revoked defendant’s 

probation, finding defendant had been arrested on a new charge (a violation of the 

condition that he obey all laws), failed to report to his probation officer and failed to 

complete community labor and drug rehabilitation programs. The trial court explained it

selected the 3-year high term because “there was a complete abysmal failure on probation 

in considering the fact he’s been given the opportunity back in March of 2013 for another 

reinstatement . . . . He’s absconded. He’s picked up a new case. And he has not 

successfully completed probation in his own matters. [¶] So the high term is 

appropriate.” Defendant timely appealed. 

DISCUSSION

A. Imposition of the High Term Was Not Error

Defendant challenges the trial court’s imposition of the three-year high term. He 

argues the trial court impermissibly based its sentencing choice on defendant’s 

unsatisfactory performance on probation in this case, which violates California Rules of 

Court, rule 4.435(b) because it was a circumstance that did not exist at the time probation 

was initially granted.1 We disagree.

 

1 All future undesignated rule references are to the California Rules of Court.
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We review a trial court’s decision to impose a particular sentence for abuse of 

discretion. Even if the court has stated both proper and improper reasons for its choice, 

we will not set aside the sentence absent a showing it is reasonably probable that the trial 

court would have chosen a lesser sentence had it known that some of its reasons were 

improper. (People v. Jones (2009) 178 Cal.App.4th 853, 860-861 (Jones).)

When a defendant violates probation, the sentencing judge may make any 

disposition of the case authorized by statute. (Rule 4.435(a).) If imposition of judgment 

was suspended at the time probation was originally granted, the sentencing court is 

statutorily authorized to impose “any time within the longest period for which the person 

might have been sentenced. . . .” (Pen. Code, § 1203.2, subd. (c).) An upper term 

sentence may be based on any aggravating circumstances the sentencing court deems 

significant, subject to certain restrictions. (Jones, supra, 178 Cal.App.4th at p. 867.) 

Relevant here is the prohibition that the length of a sentence imposed upon revocation of 

probation “must be based on circumstances existing at the time probation was granted,

and subsequent events may not be considered in selecting the base term . . . .” 

(Rule 4.435(b)(1), italics added.) Generally, a sentencing judge may not consider postprobation conduct. (People v. Colley (1980) 113 Cal.App.3d 870.)

Rule 4.435(b)(1) does not limit the sentencing judge to considering circumstances 

that existed at the time probation was originally granted if probation was revoked and 

then reinstated. Under such circumstances, the sentencing judge at a subsequent 

revocation hearing “ ’may take into account events occurring between the original grant 

and the reinstatement.’ [Citation.] ‘To hold otherwise would seriously impede a court’s 

flexibility to deal effectively with the offender who, granted the “clemency and grace” of 

probation in the hopes of achieving rehabilitation [citation], proves unable to abide by the 

conditions of that liberty the first time out.’ [Citation.]” (People v. Black (2009) 

176 Cal.App.4th 145, 151, citing People v. Harris (1990) 226 Cal.App.3d 141.)

Here, the original probation report recommended the high term based on 

aggravating circumstances that included the number and increasing seriousness of 

defendant’s prior convictions and his unsatisfactory performance on probation in prior 
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cases. Thus, defendant’s unsatisfactory performance on probation was a circumstance 

that existed at the time probation was originally granted in May 2012. That the 

sentencing judge considered this circumstance can be inferred from her reference to these 

aggravating factors at the September 2014 hearing. Further, under Black, supra, and 

Harris, supra, the sentencing judge could properly consider defendant’s poor 

performance on probation between the original grant of probation in May 2012 and the 

revocation and reinstatement of probation in March 2013. That the judge did so is 

demonstrated by her comment, “there was a complete abysmal failure on probation in 

considering the fact he’s been given the opportunity back in March of 2013 for another 

reinstatement. . . .” Although perhaps inartfully stated, there is nothing in the trial court’s 

statement that demonstrates the court only considered defendant’s conduct after March 

2013. Rather a fair reading of the record indicates the court took into account 

defendant’s performance on probation prior to the conviction in the present case and 

lawfully considered defendant’s performance between the May 2012 conviction and his 

probation reinstatement in March 2013. Assuming the sentencing judge also improperly 

considered events occurring after the March 2013 reinstatement of probation, defendant 

has not shown a reasonable probability that the court would have chosen a lesser sentence 

if it had known that was an improper reason to impose the upper term. (Jones, supra,

178 Cal.App.4th at pp. 860-861.)

DISPOSITION

The judgment is affirmed.

RUBIN, ACTING P. J.

WE CONCUR:

FLIER, J.

GRIMES, J.