Opinion ID: 1180163
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Disclosure of Identity of the Informant

Text: (2a) Defendant moved at the preliminary hearing and at the combined sections 995 and 1538.5 motion to compel disclosure of the confidential informant. It is manifest from counsel's argument below that defendant seeks disclosure both to challenge the probable cause of his arrest and to use the informant as a material witness to his guilt or innocence. (3) It is well settled that California does not require disclosure of the identity of an informant who has supplied probable cause for the issuance of a search warrant where disclosure is sought merely to aid in attacking probable cause. ( People v. Keener (1961) 55 Cal.2d 714, 723 [12 Cal. Rptr. 859, 361 P.2d 587]; see also McCray v. Illinois (1967) 386 U.S. 300 [18 L.Ed.2d 62, 87 S.Ct. 1056].) It is equally well settled that when the defendant makes an adequate showing that the informer may be a material witness on the issue of guilt or innocence, disclosure should be compelled or the case dismissed. ( Price v. Superior Court (1970) 1 Cal.3d 836 [83 Cal. Rptr. 369, 463 P.2d 721]; Honore v. Superior Court (1969) 70 Cal.2d 162 [74 Cal. Rptr. 233, 449 P.2d 169]; People v. Garcia (1967) 67 Cal.2d 830 [64 Cal. Rptr. 110, 434 P.2d 366]; People v. McShann (1958) 50 Cal.2d 802 [330 P.2d 33]; see also Roviaro v. United States (1957) 353 U.S. 53 [1 L.Ed.2d 639, 77 S.Ct. 623].) (4) To establish that the informer may be a material witness on the issue of defendant's guilt or innocence, the defendant has the burden of meeting the standard originally set forth in People v. Garcia, supra , and often repeated in the more recent decisions of this court (see, e.g., Price v. Superior Court, supra, 1 Cal.3d at p. 843; Honore v. Superior Court, supra, 70 Cal.2d at p. 168): We emphasize that a defendant seeking to discover the identity of an informant bears the burden of demonstrating that `in view of the evidence, the informer would be a material witness on the issue of guilt and nondisclosure of his identity would deprive the defendant of a fair trial.' [Citations.] That burden is discharged, however, when defendant demonstrates a reasonable possibility that the anonymous informant whose identity is sought could give evidence on the issue of guilt which might result in defendant's exoneration. `No one knows what the undisclosed informer, if produced, might testify. He might contradict or persuasively explain away the prosecution's evidence. It is the deprival of the defendants of the opportunity of producing evidence which might ... result in their exoneration which constitutes the error in this case, and we cannot assume because the prosecution evidence may seem strong that the undisclosed evidence might not prove sufficient to overcome it in the minds of the jurors.' [Citations.] ( People v. Garcia, supra, 67 Cal.2d 830, 839-840; italics omitted.) (5) As we stated most recently in Price v. Superior Court, supra : In light of the difficult problem of a defendant who is unaware of the information which might be supplied by the unnamed informer, the defendant's burden of showing that the informer is a material witness on the issue of guilt does not require proof of that fact but only some evidence of a `possibility' that the unnamed informer is a material witness. (1 Cal.3d at p. 843.) (2b) Unlike the presentation by counsel in People v. Sewell (1970) 3 Cal. App.3d 1035, 1038 [83 Cal. Rptr. 895], a case cited by the People, defense counsel here has not argued in conclusory fashion but with specificity: I don't want to put the defendant on the stand at this time, but apparently his weight is fluctuating to about 130 pounds at this time rather than 170 pounds as indicated by the affidavit. It indicates that he has dark, curly hair. He has rather straight hair. There is no reference to a beard and the like, so that the only way we can controvert those facts here is to have the person that is supposed to have made them here.... [¶] ... The indications so far as these facts are concerned here, are showing that he is obviously speaking of someone else.... While counsel appears to seek disclosure in order to attack probable cause, even though disclosure is not obligatory for such purpose ( People v. Keener, supra ), he also seeks disclosure of a witness to support a plausible theory under these circumstances: that defendant was not the individual who supplied the informant with the marijuana and that defendant did not possess the marijuana and LSD found in the Fairywood Lane house. (Compare Honore v. Superior Court, supra, 70 Cal.2d 162, 168-170; People v. Perez (1965) 62 Cal.2d 769, 773-774 [44 Cal. Rptr. 326, 401 P.2d 934].) Even though the physical discrepancy between defendant and the individual described by the informant would appear to satisfy defendant's burden as established in McShann, Garcia, Honore, and Price, additional evidence adduced at the preliminary hearing supports the conclusion that the informer may be a material witness on the issue of guilt. First, the credit transaction itself, initially described by the magistrate as incredible, plus the fact that the informer did not know the name of his alleged principal, casts some doubt on whether defendant was the principal, if indeed there was a principal. Furthermore, at the preliminary hearing one of the arresting officers testified that two young boys opened the unlocked door to the house and walked in while the officers were conducting their investigation. Defendant, however, used a key to unlock the door which was already open at the time the officers entered the house. These two events create an arguable inference, bearing directly on defendant's guilt or innocence, which might be explained by the informer: that someone else and not defendant exercised the dominion and control over the marijuana and LSD required for conviction of possession. ( People v. Redrick (1961) 55 Cal.2d 282 [10 Cal. Rptr. 823, 359 P.2d 255].) Because the discrepancy in the physical description supplied by the informant, the unusual credit arrangement and the accessibility of others to the Fairywood Lane house all bear on the issue of whether defendant was in possession of the drugs, and because the informant is a material witness on these issues, disclosure should be compelled. Furthermore, even though defendant need not prove for disclosure that the informer was a participant in or even an eyewitness to the crime ( Price v. Superior Court, supra, 1 Cal.3d 836, 843), the informant here may have been both. The issue of disclosure was properly raised at the preliminary hearing. (6) The reasons that require disclosure at the trial also require disclosure at the preliminary hearing, for the defendant has the right at such hearing to cross-examine the prosecution's witnesses (Pen. Code, § 865) and to produce witnesses in his own behalf (Pen. Code, §§ 864, 866). The exercise of these rights at the preliminary hearing may enable the defendant to show that there is no reasonable cause to commit him for trial and thus to avoid the degradation and expense of a criminal trial. ( Mitchell v. Superior Court (1958) 50 Cal.2d 827, 829 [330 P.2d 48]; see Jennings v. Superior Court (1967) 66 Cal.2d 867 [59 Cal. Rptr. 440, 428 P.2d 304].) (2c) Accordingly, we hold that defendant's motion to compel disclosure was improperly denied and that the prosecution must disclose the identity of the informant or incur a dismissal.