Source: http://www.lawlink.com/research/caselevel3/84196
Timestamp: 2019-04-21 14:19:25+00:00

Document:
THE PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Appellant, v. ANDY SUN, Defendant and Respondent.
Tony Rackauckas, District Attorney of Orange County, Brian N. Gurwitz, Senior Deputy District Attorney, for Plaintiff and Appellant.
Harry Zimmerman, Paul S. Meyer, Blythe J. Leszkay, and Lightfoot, Vandevelde, Sadowsky, Crouchley, Rutherford & Levine, LLP, for Defendant and Respondent.
The District Attorney of Orange County appeals from two different orders of the Orange County Superior Court in the above-titled case. In one of these two consolidated cases, the appeal is from an order which dismissed nine counts in the indictment charging violations of Penal Code section 12020, subdivision (a)(2), possession of large-capacity magazines. fn. 1 This dismissal was effected by the court's "merging" 10 counts of violating section 12020 into one count, in direct contradiction to the statutory authority of section 12001, subdivision (l). fn. 2 The District Attorney appeals from that portion of the order dismissing the nine counts of illegal possession of a large-capacity magazine, which is statutorily defined as "any ammunition feeding device with the capacity to accept more than 10 rounds . . . ." (See ? 12020, subds. (a)(2) & (c)(25).) As the multiple counts were specifically authorized by statute, the District Attorney contends the court's action was in excess of jurisdiction. We agree and therefore reverse the order.
In the second of the consolidated cases, the District Attorney appeals from the trial court's granting a motion to suppress the firearms and ammunition--including the large-capacity magazines which were the object of the nine dismissed counts in the previous order--seized pursuant to a search warrant from Sun's home and business. In granting the suppression motion, and its consequent dismissal of the indictment, the trial court rested on the application of a federal statute. That statute continues to "romp through this case like the proverbial 800-pound gorilla" (Gates v. Municipal Court (1992) 9 Cal.App.4th 45, 53), notwithstanding the prosecution's efforts to deflect attention from it. We affirm the order.
Eric Maher, an agent from the state Department of Justice, submitted an affidavit to a magistrate and obtained a search warrant for Sun's home and business. The information in the affidavit identified Maher as having specialized training and experience in drug detection, investigation and seizure, as [148 Cal.App.4th 378] well as search warrant affidavit development and writing. Maher related in the affidavit that he received information from another state agent, Cris Abad, that Rick Hoffpauer, a federal inspector from the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, had inspected the equipment in Sun's possession as permitted under Sun's federal firearms license. In that inspection, Hoffpauer reviewed Sun's inventory documents, which were required of him for his license, and noticed he had listed approximately 150 Omega SPS-12 assault shotguns. He requested to view them, and Sun showed him 20 of them, although Hoffpauer observed there were other like containers. He then determined Sun was not licensed to possess or import assault weapons under California law; furthermore, Sun had not registered them under state law, and thus was in violation of section 12280. A neutral magistrate issued the warrant.
Agents of the California Department of Justice executed the search warrant on Sun's home and business. The state agents discovered an amazingly large inventory of assault weapons which Sun intended to sell, fn. 3 as well as 23,000 "large-capacity magazine[s]." (? 12020, subd. (a)(2).) fn. 4 Due to the discovery of these items, the grand jury issued an indictment charging Sun with 10 counts of violating section 12020, subdivision (a)(2), based on the large-capacity ammunition magazines, and 43 counts of violating section 12280, subdivision (b), based on the assault weapons.
 Section 12001, subdivision (l) expressly grants the authority to the People to file a separate count for each of the large-capacity magazines fitting the statutory description of that item. It provides that "[f]or purposes of Section 12020, a violation of that section as to each firearm, weapon, or device enumerated therein shall constitute a distinct and separate offense." (Italics added.) Without explanation, the court disregarded this statutory provision, although the People specifically argued that it applied to the 10 counts of possessing large-capacity magazines. Instead, the court agreed with the defense that no more than one count could be charged, irrespective of the numbers of the contraband seized.
Sun responds that the trial court must have implicitly exercised its discretion in granting the consolidation motion, which we must review for abuse of discretion. (See People v. Ochoa (1998) 19 Cal.4th 353, 408.) He argues that the decision must be upheld because there was a rational basis for the consolidation--i.e., all items were possessed at one time and in one place, thus implying only one offense, as held in People v. Kirk (1989) 211 Cal.App.3d 58 and People v. Rowland (1999) 75 Cal.App.4th 61.
 Moreover, Sun's response fails to understand the definition of consolidation, as that term is used in section 954. "Consolidation of accusatory pleadings," as used in section 954, means that multiple counts, charged originally in separate pleadings, are tried together (? 954), not that multiple counts are merged into one. Merger is a separate doctrine, and occurs only when multiple offenses are found to be necessarily included in one another. (See People v. Ortega (1998) 19 Cal.4th 686, 692-693.) In such a case, section 654--not section 954--permits dismissal of those counts charging the necessarily included offenses. However, by definition, this occurs only after conviction as section 954 specifically provides "[a]n accusatory pleading may charge . . . different statements of the same offense . . . [and] the defendant may be convicted of any number of the offenses charged," notwithstanding one may be included within the other. (Ortega, supra, 19 Cal.4th at 693 ["The necessarily included offense rule is used to determine whether a defendant improperly has been convicted of both a greater offense and an included offense, or properly has been convicted of separate offenses." (Italics added.)].
The court's order, dismissing nine counts of the indictment, must be reversed.
The trial court also granted the defense motion to suppress all evidence seized under the warrant. It stated in its ruling that it found "suppression of the evidence obtained by the State of California is required by 26 U.S.C. section 5848. The search was based on evidence obtained from the defendant's compliance with the National Firearms Act [NFA]." The District Attorney appeals from this order, contending there was nothing in the affidavit lifted from any records Sun filed or kept as required by the NFA; and, even if there was such evidence, there is no authority that a warrant issued by a magistrate should be suppressed notwithstanding any arguable violation of title 26 United States Code section 5848(a). Lastly, the [148 Cal.App.4th 381] District Attorney contends, the fruits of an executed search warrant are admissible under the "good faith" exception of United States v. Leon (1984) 468 U.S. 897, irrespective of errors made prior to its issuance. Because suppression of evidence is only possible if mandated by federal law (see Cal. Const. art. I, ? 28, subd. (d)), suppression was, he argues, unauthorized in this situation.
The affidavit for the search warrant for Sun's home and business related that the federal inspector examined Sun's records and then determined that a series of assault weapons were listed on those documents, weapons that the inspector knew were prohibited by California law but not by federal law. He then confirmed the presence of 20 of those assault shotguns in Sun's inventory before contacting the state authorities with his observations and information. The language in the affidavit indicates that the inspection and observation of those assault weapons were triggered by the records provided to the federal inspector by Sun. Thus, the records that Sun provided to the inspector were the exclusive source of information from which the entire investigation grew.
The District Attorney contends that this privilege or immunity grant applies only to evidence proffered in a criminal trial, not to information alleged in a search warrant affidavit or any non-trial aspect of a criminal prosecution. He relies on two cases from the federal district court in Michigan to support his position: U.S. v. Wolfe (E.D. Mich. 1999) 32 F.Supp.2d 945 and United States v. Hunter (E.D. Mich. 1994) 843 F.Supp. 235. He acknowledges these opinions are not binding on our Court, but argues they provide compellingly persuasive support. We disagree: Not only is there higher authority contradicting that interpretation, but both cases are clearly distinguished--legally and factually--from the present situation.
In response, Wolfe contended the privilege or immunity statute of 26 U.S.C. section 5848 applied to his situation, thereby taking his case out of the exclusive application of the confidentiality statute. The court relied on an earlier opinion--United States v. Hunter (E.D. Mich. 1994) 843 F.Supp. 235--and reiterated its [148 Cal.App.4th 383] interpretation of the privilege statute to be limited to evidence admitted in a criminal trial. Relying on the Hunter opinion, the federal court held that information mandatorily disclosed under the NFA by a licensee can be used for investigative purposes. (U.S. v. Wolfe, supra, 32 F.Supp.2d at 953.) It is for this point that the District Attorney invokes both the Hunter and Wolfe opinions, arguing Sun's records were only used for investigative purposes and thus the privilege statute of section 5848 was inapplicable.
Moreover, the Wolfe opinion relied exclusively and entirely on selected language from United States v. Hunter, supra, 843 F.Supp. 235, as the authority for its unique holding. The earlier Hunter opinion stated that section "5848(a) bar[red] the use of such records as evidence." (Id. at p. 252, original italics.) However, it did not mean that to be the exclusive application of the privilege statute. The Hunter court went on to say that it "read this provision to prohibit the introduction of protected records in a trial; it does not appear to proscribe the Government's utilization of the records so far in this case in order to investigate and indict Defendants." (Ibid., italics added.) The inapplicability of the privilege was not due to the investigatory use of the information; it was due to the exception to the privilege found in 26 U.S.C. section 5848(b). The statutory exception to the privilege applied to subsequent offenses relating to false information. Hunter and his colleagues were charged with conspiracy because they submitted allegedly false information in their applications to transfer machineguns and machinegun conversion kits. (Id. at pp. 238-239.) Additionally, they allegedly submitted the falsified applications before engaging in the alleged overt acts in furtherance of the conspiracy for which they were charged. Thus, the statutory exception found in 26 U.S.C. section 5848(b) applied, and Hunter could not invoke the privilege and immunity provisions of 26 U.S.C. section 5848(a).
The Hunter court emphasized that 26 United States Code section 5848(b) created an exception to the privilege or immunity provisions of section 5848(a), and that this exception was for "'future crimes' and 'furnishing false information'. . . ." (United States v. Hunter, supra, 843 F.Supp. at p. 252.) It found the defendants' alleged conspiracy was a future crime of furnishing false information under the NFA and the supplementary legislation known as the Gun Control Act. (Id. at pp. 250-253.) Thus, the protection of the privilege conferred by 26 United States Code section 5848(a) was unavailable to the defendants, not because the defendants' applications were used as the basis for an investigation, but because the case was a "future crime" involving the "furnishing [of] false information" specifically excepted under subsection (b) of the statute.
Sun is faced with neither a crime resulting from his falsification of his NFA documents nor a future crime occurring subsequent to the transactions reflected in his NFA records. The documents reviewed by the federal inspector reflected Sun's concurrent possession of firearms. Thus, he properly was protected by the privilege or immunity provisions of 26 United State Code section 5848 at the time the federal inspector breached the confidentiality protections of 26 United States Code section 6103 and divulged the privileged information to the state authorities.
Amicus curiae, the Attorney General of California (Amicus), argues that the safety of California citizens requires that we encourage the cooperation between federal and state authorities as practiced in the case before us. Additionally, he contends the NFA was not the authority under which Hoffpauer inspected Sun's records; it was the Gun Control Act of 1968 which empowered Hoffpauer to inspect, and there is no record-keeping responsibility under that statute. Thus, he argues, there was no basis to apply the privilege protection of 26 United States Code section 5848 (a)--which relates to the NFA, not the Gun Control Act--much less to suppress the evidence. Finally, Amicus proposes that none of the items observed by Hoffpauer--and seized under the search warrant--fell under the federal definition of "firearms" covered by the NFA. This latter argument appears to fail: 26 United States Code section 5845(a) defines a firearm for the purposes of the NFA in very specific detail and there is no indication in the record whether the seized items fit this description, fn. 8 but the chapter also defines a "machinegun" as "any weapon which shoots, is designed to shoot, or can be readily restored to shoot, automatically more than one shot, without manual reloading, by a single function of the trigger. . . ." (26 U.S.C. ? 5845(b).) This definition is essentially identical to that for a machinegun found in section 12200, possession of which is generally barred under state law. (See ? 12220, subd. (a).) From the information presented in the warrant's affidavit and implicitly found by the trial court, the statute was applicable. No evidence was presented at the suppression hearing to contradict this finding.
Nothing we say here in any way seeks to discourage the continued cooperation between state and federal police authorities. To the contrary, we encourage it consistent with the law established for both those jurisdictions. In this instance, however, the Congress, in direct response to United States Supreme Court mandate, has provided that information compelled from a weapons dealer may not be used against him in a criminal proceeding of any kind, apart from the exception provided in 5845(b). We abide by that clear declaration, as must the police authorities in all jurisdictions.
In case numbered G036443, the trial court's order suppressing the evidence and then dismissing the remaining indictment is affirmed. In G035328, the trial court's order, dismissing nine counts of a violation of section 12020, subdivision (a)(2), is reversed. The case is remanded with the following directions: The trial court must determine if dismissal of the remanded nine counts is now required based on the seizure of evidence deemed in violation of the Fourth Amendment as upheld in case numbered G036443. If so, the trial court must dismiss the remaining nine counts in the indictment. If not, and the People have evidence to prove those counts extraneous to the fruits of the search under the warrant, those counts may proceed.
Bedsworth, J., and Fybel, J., concurred.
?FN 1. All further statutory references are to the Penal Code unless otherwise stated.
?FN 2. Originally, Sun faced 55 counts, but he raised a motion for the court to consolidate 10 counts of weapons possession-intended for sale-into one count (see ? 12280, subd. (a)(1)), 10 counts of assault weapons possession into a second count (see ? 12280, subd. (b)), 10 counts of large-capacity ammunition magazines into a third count (see ? 12020, subds. (a)(2) & (c)(25)). The trial court granted the motion, resulting in a pleading charging five counts: one count of possessing assault weapons for sale, one count of possessing assault weapons, one count of possessing large-capacity magazines, and two counts of child endangerment.
?FN 3. There were 510 assault weapons, such as the Omega-SPS-12, AK-47, Uzi, etc.
?FN 5. Section 954 provides that an "accusatory pleading may charge two or more different offenses connected together in their commission, or different statements of the same offense or two or more different offenses of the same class of crimes or offenses, under separate counts, and if two or more accusatory pleadings are filed in such cases in the same court, the court may order them to be consolidated. The prosecution is not required to elect between the different offenses or counts set forth in the accusatory pleading, but the defendant may be convicted of any number of the offenses charged . . .; provided, that the court in which a case is triable, in the interests of justice and for good cause shown, may in its discretion order that the different offenses or counts set forth in the accusatory pleading be tried separately or divided into two or more groups and each of said groups tried separately. . . ."
However, the Carleisha P. case is of no assistance to Sun, as he was not charged under any statute prohibiting possession of "ammunition." Rather, he was charged under section 12020, subdivision (a)(2), which prohibits possession of a "large-capacity magazine." Thus, the Caleisha P. holding and rationale are entirely inapplicable.
?FN 8. It is unknown to us whether most of the seized items fit these very detailed specifications as the record is devoid of any such discussion.

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