Opinion ID: 1120756
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Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Duration of Commission of Robbery

Text: In People v. Croy, supra, 41 Cal.3d 1, we expressly left open the question whether a person may properly be classified as an aider and abettor, where he had no knowledge of a robbery until the robber's entry into the getaway car but thereafter knowingly aided the robber in the getaway. ( Id., at p. 15, fn. 9.) [6] To answer this question, we must first look to the elements of aiding and abetting liability. (1) A person aids and abets the commission of a crime when he or she, (i) with knowledge of the unlawful purpose of the perpetrator, (ii) and with the intent or purpose of committing, facilitating or encouraging commission of the crime, (iii) by act or advice, aids, promotes, encourages or instigates the commission of the crime. ( People v. Beeman, supra, 35 Cal.3d 547, 561.) Beeman presupposes that, if a person in fact aids, promotes, encourages or instigates commission of a crime, the requisite intent to render such aid must be formed prior to or during commission of that offense. ( People v. Beeman, supra, 35 Cal.3d 547, 558 [imposing aider and abettor liability because defendant intended to provide aid prior to commission of robbery]; People v. Mitchell (1986) 183 Cal. App.3d 325, 330 [228 Cal. Rptr. 286] [upholding aiding and abetting conviction based on inference of knowledge of robbery during the actual taking].) It is legally and logically impossible to both form the requisite intent and in fact aid, promote, encourage, or facilitate commission of a crime after the commission of that crime has ended. (2) In the case before us, we must determine the duration of the commission of a robbery for purposes of assessing aider and abettor liability. We have held that once all elements of a robbery are satisfied, the offense has been initially committed and the principal may be found guilty of robbery, as distinct from a mere attempt. (See, e.g., People v. Bigelow (1984) 37 Cal.3d 731, 753 [209 Cal. Rptr. 328, 691 P.2d 994, 64 A.L.R.4th 723], and cases cited therein.) This threshold of guilt-establishment is a fixed point in time, but is not synonymous with commission of a crime for our purposes. For purposes of determining aider and abettor liability, the commission of a robbery continues until all acts constituting the offense have ceased. [7] The taking element of robbery itself has two necessary elements, gaining possession of the victim's property and asporting or carrying away the loot. (See People v. Perhab (1949) 92 Cal. App.2d 430 [206 P.2d 1133].) Thus, in determining the duration of a robbery's commission we must necessarily focus on the duration of the final element of the robbery, asportation. Although, for purposes of establishing guilt, the asportation requirement is initially satisfied by evidence of slight movement (see People v. Clark (1945) 70 Cal. App.2d 132, 133 [160 P.2d 553]), asportation is not confined to a fixed point in time. [8] The asportation continues thereafter as long as the loot is being carried away to a place of temporary safety. Therefore, in order to fulfill the requirements of Beeman, supra, 35 Cal.3d 547, for conviction of the more serious offense of aiding and abetting a robbery, a getaway driver must form the intent to facilitate or encourage commission of the robbery prior to or during the carrying away of the loot to a place of temporary safety. [9] In determining the duration of the asportation, we reject the argument that commission of the robbery necessarily ends once the loot is removed from the immediate presence of the victim. Although the immediate presence language comes directly from section 211, this language does not pertain to the duration of robbery. Section 211 defines robbery as the felonious taking of personal property in the possession of another, from his person or immediate presence. ... (Italics added.) Taking from the person and from the immediate presence are alternatives. These terms are spatially, rather than temporally, descriptive. They refer to the area from which the property is taken, not how far it is taken. (See People v. Hayes (1990) 52 Cal.3d 577, 626-628 [276 Cal. Rptr. 874, 802 P.2d 376]; People v. Bauer (1966) 241 Cal. App.2d 632, 642 [50 Cal. Rptr. 687].) Put another way, these limitations on the scope of the robbery statute relate to the gaining possession component of the taking as distinct from the carrying away component. We also reject the argument for our purposes here that commission of the robbery continues through the escape to a place of temporary safety, regardless of whether or not the loot is being carried away simultaneously. In the context of certain statutes concerning ancillary consequences of robbery, robbery is said to continue through the escape to a place of temporary safety, whether or not the asportation of the loot coincides with the escape (hereafter, the escape rule). (See, e.g., People v. Laursen (1972) 8 Cal.3d 192, 200 [104 Cal. Rptr. 425, 501 P.2d 1145] [for purposes of section 209, commission or perpetration of a robbery continues through the robber's escape to a location of temporary safety] [italics added].) [10] The escape rule originated in the context of the felony-murder doctrine in the landmark case of People v. Boss (1930) 210 Cal. 245 [290 P. 881]. (See also, People v. Salas (1972) 7 Cal.3d 812, 823-824 [103 Cal. Rptr. 431, 500 P.2d 7, 58 A.L.R.3d 832]; People v. Ketchel (1963) 59 Cal.2d 503, 524 [30 Cal. Rptr. 538, 381 P.2d 394]; People v. Kendrick (1961) 56 Cal.2d 71, 90 [14 Cal. Rptr. 13, 363 P.2d 13].) We have also applied the escape rule to several other ancillary consequences of robbery. (See, e.g., People v. Laursen, supra, 8 Cal.3d 192 [kidnapping committed during escape from robbery is kidnapping to commit robbery within section 209]; People v. Carroll (1970) 1 Cal.3d 581 [83 Cal. Rptr. 176, 463 P.2d 400] [injury inflicted on robbery victim after property had been asported but before robber escaped to a place of temporary safety occurred in the course of commission of the robbery for purposes of bodily injury enhancement].) Never, however, have we applied the escape rule in contexts other than the construction of statutes concerning certain ancillary consequences of robbery. Nonetheless, one Court of Appeal has done so. Without substantial discussion, the Court of Appeal in People v. Jardine (1981) 116 Cal. App.3d 907 [172 Cal. Rptr. 408], adopted the escape rule for purposes of determining aider and abettor liability. [11] The People assert that we should here do the same. The defendant in Jardine, a getaway driver in a store robbery, was charged as an aider and abettor. At trial, the defendant and a cohort testified that the defendant had no knowledge of the robbery until the perpetrators entered the car after robbing the store. After being instructed on the elements of aiding and abetting but not on those of accessory after the fact, the jury found the defendant guilty of robbery. The Court of Appeal affirmed the conviction. In its view, the testimony unambiguously establishe[d] that [the defendant] was an [aider and abettor] to the robbery, in that he knowingly aided [the others] to carry off the loot.... [¶] Since a robbery is a continuing crime which is not completed until the robbers reach a place of temporary safety, [the defendant's] assistance in the escape was necessarily a participation in the robbery.... (116 Cal. App.3d at p. 919, italics added.) Thus, the court concluded, the evidence did not warrant an accessory instruction. ( Id., at p. 922.) In holding that assistance in the escape is necessarily participation in the robbery for purposes of determining aider and abettor liability, the court in Jardine relied on the cases discussed above dealing with ancillary consequences of robbery, including Laursen, Salas, Boss, and Carroll. ( People v. Jardine, supra, 116 Cal. App.3d 907, 919-921.) For the several reasons discussed below, however, we decline to adopt the escape rule for our purposes. First, although we agree that the escape rule serves the legitimate public policy considerations of deterrence and culpability in the context of determining certain ancillary consequences of robbery, the rule does not similarly serve those considerations in the context of determining principal liability as an aider and abettor of a robbery. In Laursen, supra, 8 Cal.3d 192, 198, we recognized that the escape rule served public policy because the primary purpose of the kidnapping-to-commit-robbery statute is to impose harsher criminal sanctions to deter activity that substantially increases the risk of harm. Similarly, in People v. Bigelow, supra, 37 Cal.3d 731, 753, we pointed out that the escape rule is used in felony-murder cases to determine when a killing is so closely related to an underlying felony as to justify an enhanced punishment for the killing. These considerations of deterrence and culpability are well served by application of the escape rule to statutes concerning certain ancillary consequences of robbery. These same public policy considerations are not, however, equally applicable to the determination of aider and abettor liability. A primary rationale for punishing aiders and abettors as principals  to deter them from aiding or encouraging the commission of offenses  is not served by imposing aider and abettor liability on a getaway driver in a robbery if that person was unaware of the robbery until after all of the acts constituting robbery, including the asportation, had ceased. Such a driver is powerless to either prevent the robbery, or end the acts constituting the robbery if such acts have already ceased. Although the law should also deter the getaway driver from helping the robbers escape from justice after commission of the crime has ended, this goal is appropriately served by the threat of liability as an accessory after the fact. Thus, in determining liability as an aider and abettor, the focus must be on the acts constituting the robbery, not the escape. Furthermore, in our view, adopting the escape rule for purposes of determining aider and abettor liability would be inconsistent with reasonable concepts of culpability. As noted, in certain circumstances the asportation will not coincide with the escape. A getaway driver, whose intent to aid in the escape is formed after asportation has ceased, cannot facilitate or encourage commission of the robbery. [12] Rather, the effect of his or her actions is only to lessen the chance that the perpetrators will be captured and held accountable for their crimes. Thus the culpability of such a getaway driver is that of an accessory after the fact, rather than that of a principal. This distinction comports with the language of section 32, which expressly defines accessory liability as including a person who aids a principal with intent that the principal avoid or escape from arrest. (See ante, fn. 2.) Second, it would be illogical to adopt the escape rule for purposes of determining aider and abettor liability. Such a holding would eliminate the distinction between aider and abettor liability and accessory liability in the context of getaway drivers in a manner both contrary to statute, and out of step with reasonable concepts of culpability and practical considerations of deterrence, as discussed above. (See People v. Scott, supra, 170 Cal. App.3d at p. 271; cf. People v. Brady (1987) 190 Cal. App.3d 124, 131 [235 Cal. Rptr. 248].) Moreover, the escape, not being an element of robbery, should not be used to define the duration of robbery for purposes of determining aider and abettor liability. Rather, in delineating a crime it is logical to look to the elements that constitute that crime. Third, cases applying the escape rule to certain ancillary consequences statutes do not compel the conclusion that commission of a robbery also continues through the escape for our purposes here. In each of these cases we have been careful not to imply that this rule should apply outside the legal contexts expressly addressed. (See, e.g., People v. Salas, supra, 7 Cal.3d 812, 823 [a fleeing robber's failure to reach a place of temporary safety is alone sufficient to establish the continuity of the robbery within the felony murder rule ] [italics added]; People v. Bigelow, supra, 37 Cal.3d 731, 753, 754 [drawing upon the test used in felony-murder cases and adopting the same standard for the special circumstance of murder `to perfect an escape'].) Last, we note that the Courts of Appeal have refused to adopt the escape rule for purposes of determining aider and abettor liability in analogous circumstances. As is the case with robbery, the potential of felony-murder liability of burglars continues through the escape until the perpetrators reach a place of temporary safety. ( People v. Fuller (1978) 86 Cal. App.3d 618 [150 Cal. Rptr. 515].) Nonetheless, the rule has developed in the Courts of Appeal that one who forms the intent to aid a burglar after the acts constituting the burglary have ceased cannot be liable as an aider and abettor to the burglary. (See, e.g., People v. Macedo (1989) 213 Cal. App.3d 554 [261 Cal. Rptr. 754]; People v. Brady, supra, 190 Cal. App.3d 124; People v. Markus (1978) 82 Cal. App.3d 477 [147 Cal. Rptr. 151].) [13] Accordingly, we decline to adopt the escape rule, applicable in the context of certain ancillary consequences of robbery, for purposes of determining aider and abettor liability. [14] For purposes of determining liability as an aider and abettor, the commission of robbery continues so long as the loot is being carried away to a place of temporary safety.