Opinion ID: 2545831
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Failure to Bifurcate Trial on the Charge of Felon in Possession of a Concealable Firearm

Text: In addition to the three murder counts, defendant was convicted of a 1985 violation of section 12021. In 1985, that provision prohibited any person who had been convicted of a felony offense from possessing any firearm capable of being concealed upon the person. (Stats.1983, ch. 1092, ง 326.5, p. 4062.) In July 1981, defendant had been convicted of the felony of recklessly burning an inhabited structure (ง 452, subd. (b)), the house of murder victim Duarte, who had disappeared in January of that same year. Before trial, the defense moved to bifurcate the trial on the felon in possession of a firearm charge. Specifically, counsel stated that defendant was prepared to ... waive jury on that [charge] ... and have the Court ... out of the presence of the jury decide it. The trial court, citing People v. Valentine (1986) 42 Cal.3d 170, 228 Cal.Rptr. 25, 720 P.2d 913 (Valentine ), denied the request. It stated that the question of being a felon in possession of a firearm was for the jury to determine, and that case law has only given us one area where we can adjust that, ... if there is a stipulation as to the defendant's status as an ex-felon, then the nature of the particular felony can be withheld from the jury. Defendant thereafter agreed to stipulate that he had been convicted of a felony, and he asked the court to sanitize the felon-in-possession charge such that the details of the underlying felony would be withheld from the jury. At the end of the guilt phase trial, the court instructed the jury under CALJIC No. 12.44 that the previous felony conviction has already been established ... so that no further proof of that fact is required. Defendant now contends that the trial court's ruling on the motion to bifurcate was error requiring reversal. According to defendant, the trial court misinterpreted Valentine, supra, 42 Cal.3d 170, 228 Cal. Rptr. 25, 720 P.2d 913, as allowing only two options when a prior conviction is a substantive element of a current charge: Either the defendant admits to having a prior conviction and the court sanitizes the prior by keeping from the jury the nature of the offense, or the prosecution proves the prior conviction in open court. Defendant argues that Valentine allows a third option: full bifurcation of trial on the charge involving a prior conviction by having the trial court decide the charge outside the jury's presence. Defendant misconstrues Valentine. This court's 1986 decision in Valentine, supra, 42 Cal.3d 170, 228 Cal.Rptr. 25, 720 P.2d 913, interpreted article I, section 28, subdivision (f) of the California Constitution, added to the Constitution by Proposition 8, an initiative that the California electorate passed in 1982. It states: When a prior felony conviction is an element of any felony offense, it shall be proven to the trier of fact in open court. (Cal. Const., art. I, ง 28, subd. (f) (article I, section 28(f)).) Valentine concluded that the language was directed at People v. Hall (1980) 28 Cal.3d 143, 167 Cal.Rptr. 844, 616 P.2d 826, which held that when an element of a charged offense requires proof that the defendant has a felony conviction, and the defendant offers to stipulate to the prior conviction, it is error to inform the jury either of the fact that the defendant has a prior felony conviction or the nature of the felony. (Id. at pp. 153-154,167 Cal.Rptr. 844, 616 P.2d 826.) Valentine held that article I, section 28(f) eliminated the per se rule of Hall by requiring that the jury be advised that the defendant has suffered a prior felony conviction if such felony conviction is an element of a current charge. ( Valentine, supra, 42 Cal.3d at p. 173, 228 Cal.Rptr. 25, 720 P.2d 913.) But if the defendant offers to stipulate to a prior felony conviction, article I, section 28(f) allows evidence of the nature of that felony to be withheld from the jury. ( Valentine, supra, at p. 173, 228 Cal.Rptr. 25, 720 P.2d 913.) Thus, as the trial court properly ruled in this case, Valentine allows one of two alternatives when a defendant's prior felony conviction is an element of a charged crime: (1) The prosecution can prove the conviction in open court, and that proof can include both the fact that the defendant has previously been convicted of a felony offense as well as the nature of the felony involved; or (2) the defendant can stipulate to having a felony conviction and thereby keep from the jury the nature of the particular felony. In insisting that Valentine allows a third option, that of full bifurcation of trial on the charge of being a felon in possession of a concealable firearm, defendant quotes this language from Valentine: [T]he court must balance the legitimate benefits ... of a consolidated trial against the likelihood that disclosure of ex-felon status in a joint trial will affect the jury's verdict on charges to which that status is irrelevant. ( Valentine, supra, 42 Cal.3d at p. 180, fn. 3, 228 Cal.Rptr. 25, 720 P.2d 913.) Contrary to defendant's assertion here, that language pertains not to a motion to bifurcate trial on a charge that requires proof of a prior felony conviction (the motion brought here), but to a motion to sever charges properly joined under section 954. The relevant portion of Valentine's footnote 3 states in full: [Defendant argues that the trial court should at least have granted his motion to sever the firearm-possession count from the robbery charge in order to prevent disclosure of defendant's criminal record from affecting the jury's deliberations on the latter crime. We need not resolve that contention, since we hold that disclosure of the nature of defendant's priors was reversible error as to all counts. [ถ] ... [W]e decline to rule that such a procedure is mandatory in all cases. When the joinder statute (ง 954) would otherwise permit consolidation of charges, a trial court should, if requested, carefully exercise its discretion whether to try [the firearm possession] count separately `in the interests of justice.' ( Valentine, supra, 42 Cal.3d at p. 180, fn. 3, 228 Cal.Rptr. 25, 720 P.2d 913.) This is followed by the sentence on which defendant relies, which states that a court considering such a severance request must balance the various interests. (Ibid.) Because this court in Valentine expressly declined to decide whether the trial court in that case abused its discretion in failing to grant the defendant's severance motion, its discussion of severance was dictum, as defendant acknowledges. (See Palmer v. GTE California, Inc. (2003) 30 Cal.4th 1265, 1278, 135 Cal.Rptr.2d 654, 70 P.3d 1067 [`an opinion is not authority for a proposition not therein considered']; People v. Scheid (1997) 16 Cal.4th 1, 17, 65 Cal.Rptr.2d 348, 939 P.2d 748 [same].) Moreover, defendant concedes he did not move to sever the firearm-possession count from the three murder counts. He asserts, however, that although the Valentine dictum discussed only severance explicitly its rationale ... would apply to permitting full bifurcation (a mini-trial following the guilt trial on the main charges). Not so. In footnote 3 in Valentine this court expressly rejected the idea that article I, section 28(f) should be interpreted to require bifurcated trials, with proof of [prior felony convictions] made only to the judge, who would be the `trier of fact' for this limited purpose. ( Valentine, supra, 42 Cal.3d at p. 179, fn. 3, 228 Cal.Rptr. 25, 720 P.2d 913.) To summarize: Valentine, supra, 42 Cal.3d 170, 228 Cal.Rptr. 25, 720 P.2d 913, allows the trial court only two options when a prior conviction is a substantive element of a current charge: Either the prosecution proves each element of the offense to the jury, or the defendant stipulates to the conviction and the court sanitizes the prior by telling the jury that the defendant has a prior felony conviction, without specifying the nature of the felony committed. These are the same two options the trial court here offered defendant. Accordingly, there was no error. Defendant accuses his trial counsel of rendering ineffective assistance, because, faced with those two options, counsel chose to have the court sanitize the prior felony conviction. Defendant contends that counsel's decision not to reveal to the jury the nature of defendant's prior felony conviction did him more harm than good for this reason: The prior pertained to the relatively minor offense of recklessly burning an inhabited dwelling. Because the jury had already heard evidence that defendant had set fire to Duarte's house, defendant argues that the jury might have speculated that his prior felony conviction was for an offense other than setting fire to Duarte's house, possibly something far more serious, such as murder. Preliminarily, we note that nothing in the record supports this conjecture by defendant. To establish a violation of the constitutional right to effective assistance of counsel, a defendant must show both that his counsel's performance was deficient when measured against the standard of a reasonably competent attorney and that this deficient performance caused prejudice in the sense that it `so undermined the proper functioning of the adversarial process that the trial cannot be relied on as having produced a just result.' ( Strickland v. Washington (1984) 466 U.S. 668, 686 [104 S.Ct. 2052, 80 L.Ed.2d 674]; see also People v. Wader (1993) 5 Cal.4th 610, 636 [20 Cal.Rptr .2d 788, 854 P.2d 80].) If a defendant has failed to show that the challenged actions of counsel were prejudicial, a reviewing court may reject the claim on that ground without determining whether counsel's performance was deficient. ( Strickland v. Washington, supra, 466 U.S. at p. 697 [104 S.Ct. 2052].) ( People v. Kipp (2001) 26 Cal.4th 1100, 1122-1123, 113 Cal.Rptr.2d 27, 33 P.3d 450.) In determining whether an attorney's conduct so affected the reliability of the trial as to undermine confidence that it produced a just result ( Strickland v. Washington, supra, 466 U.S. at p. 686, 104 S.Ct. 2052), we consider whether but for counsel's purportedly deficient performance there is a reasonable probability the result of the proceeding would have been different. ( People v. Cash (2002) 28 Cal.4th 703, 734, 122 Cal.Rptr.2d 545, 50 P.3d 332; see Strickland v. Washington, supra, at p. 694, 104 S.Ct. 2052.) That standard cannot be met here. Given defendant's confessions to the three murders in this case, and the physical and circumstantial evidence indicating that he was the killer in each instance, no reasonable probability exists that the jury would have acquitted him had it learned that his prior felony conviction was for reckless burning of an occupied dwelling rather than some other and perhaps more serious crime.