Opinion ID: 1406068
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The Word crimes in Subdivision (c)

Text: Turning first to subdivision (c)'s provision that a full, consecutive term may be imposed for each ESO conviction whether or not the crimes were committed during a single transaction, it is at once apparent that the whether or not language was intended to broaden the scope of subdivision (c)'s effect not to restrict it. Thus, it is highly illogical to suppose that the reference to the crimes in the broadening clause was intended to alter the express applicability of the court's discretion to each violation. (2) Further, throughout California's Penal Code, the singular number includes the plural, and the plural the singular. ... (§ 7, italics added; People v. Jamison, supra, 150 Cal. App.3d 1167, 1175.) The rule of construction enunciated in section 7 is no mere rubric  it is the law. (1b) Therefore, to the extent practicable, we must interpret the plural word crimes in subdivision (c) to be consistent with the singular phrase each violation appearing earlier in the provision. Viewed in this way, it is quite clear that the Legislature's use of the plural crimes was not necessarily intended to restrict subdivision (c)'s operation to situations in which a defendant stands convicted of more than one ESO. Finally, and most importantly, the assumption that the words the crimes in subdivision (c) refer only to the ESO's is incorrect. Subdivision (c) starts with the phrase In lieu of the term provided in Section 1170.1 and in order to bring section 1170.1 into play at all, the defendant must have been convicted of multiple crimes. In our view, it is to these multiple crimes that the language the crimes in the final clause of subdivision (c) must refer. The multiple crimes necessary to bring section 1170.1 into play need not be multiple violent sex offenses; hence subdivision (c)'s reference to the crimes likewise does not necessarily refer to multiple ESO's. The entire whether or not clause is to be read as the Legislature's shorthand pronouncement that the court may discretionarily impose a full, consecutive sentence for each ESO conviction, irrespective of whether the violent sex crime and the other crime making section 1170.1 potentially applicable were committed during a single transaction. Nothing in the use of the plural the crimes in subdivision (c), therefore, limits that provision's application to the situation in which two or more ESO convictions are being sentenced. Contrary to the suggestion made, this conclusion is in fact confirmed by comparing the use of the word crimes in subdivision (c) to that word's use in subdivision (d).