Court Opinion

ID: 9608751
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 03:16:51.414799+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:06:24.726978
License: Public Domain

ASHBURN, J., Dissenting.
Judicial philosophy which weakens efficient enforcement of the laws, especially those aimed at suppression of the sale and use of narcotics, is to my mind a deplorable development of recent years. But I cannot acquiesce in what I believe to be double punishment for a single indivisible transaction wherein an addict is in possession of a narcotic.
Section 654, Penal Code,* while it speaks in the singular of an act or omission, has not been construed so narrowly, and has been applied in such manner as to accomplish its benign purpose of punishing a wrongdoer but once for a single wrong consisting of a combination of immediately related acts. The questions involved in application of section 654 to a given ease are distinct from those of former jeopardy and included offenses. (People v. Kehoe, 33 Cal.2d 711, 713 [204 P.2d 321].) People v. Clemett, 208 Cal. 142, 144 [280 P. 681], says: “As early as People v. Shotwell, 27 Cal. 394, and People v. Frank, 28 Cal. 507, it was held that co-operative acts constituting but one offense when committed by the same person at the same time, when combined, charge but one crime and but one punishment can be inflicted as one offense.” At page 145: “That the rule announced in said earlier decisions is the settled law of this state is confirmed by many subsequent eases.” People v. Roberts, 40 Cal.2d 483, 491 [254 P.2d 501], quotes with approval and applies the foregoing language. People v. Brown, 49 Cal.2d 577, 591 [320 P.2d 5], says: “Section 654 has been applied not only where there was but one ‘act’ in the ordinary sense . . . but also where a course of conduct violated more than one statute and the problem was whether it comprised a divisible transaction which could be punished under more than one statute within the meaning of section 654. Where the question is whether a transaction is divisible or indivisible, each case must be resolved on its facts. ” *55People v. Tenney, 162 Cal.App.2d 458, 462 [328 P.2d 254] (hearing denied), quotes People v. Branch, 119 Cal.App.2d 490, 495 [260 P.2d 27], as follows: “In determining this question the courts have refused to dissect the evidence minutely in an attempt to find separate offenses, but, on the contrary, have held that a broad transactional approach should be made.” That we have at bar a single indivisible transaction, or “co-operative acts constituting but one offense when committed by the same person at the same time” seems clear from the record.
Alerted by somewhat suspicious movements of an automobile occupied by defendant Garcia and his eodefendants Ayala and Contreras, Police Officer Woodring “staked out” the vehicle which was parked in a service station. The three occupants went into the rest room where they remained for 35 minutes. They came out together and drove off. The officer followed, clocked their speed at 53 miles in a 35-mile zone and stopped them. All three got out of the car. Asked if they had been drinking, all said they had been drinking beer. Woodring saw Garcia remove an article from his left pants pocket, make a backward throwing motion with his left arm, and Sergeant Hoiten picked up a Pall Mall cigarette package which contained heroin and an eye dropper. Search revealed in Ayala’s pocket a paper match book with a hypodermic needle in it. This was on November 26, 1957. The three men were arrested and on the next day one D. La Penna, of the narcotic detail of Los Angeles County sheriff’s office, filed in the municipal court of Alhambra Judicial District a complaint charging appellant with a misdemeanor committed on November 26, 1957, a violation of section 11721, Health and Safety Code, namely, addiction to unlawful use of narcotics. On the same day La Penna filed in the same court a complaint charging appellant with a felony committed on November 26, 1957, a violation of section 11500, Health and Safety Code, possession of narcotics. On December 32th appellant was tried upon the misdemeanor charge, found guilty and sentenced to 180 days in jail; commitment was issued. At that trial the witnesses were Officer Thomas E. Woodring, Officer Stanley G. Fletcher and Charles Avila; the heroin and paraphernalia taken from the three men at the time of arrest on the 26th were introduced in evidence. On December 16th a preliminary hearing wás had upon the felony charge and Woodring, Fletcher, Sergeant Hoiten and Officer Klein (a forensic chem*56ist) testified; the same exhibits were received in evidence which had been received in the misdemeanor trial and appellant was held to answer in the superior court. When that trial was reached he entered a plea of former jeopardy and it was stipulated that defendant “be deemed to have testified if he was called and sworn he would testify that the prosecution for the narcotic addiction as reflected in that docket arose out of an arrest in this case involving the possession of heroin.” ■There was no evidence to the contrary. The same exhibits were placed in evidence and the case was submitted upon the preliminary transcript plus the stipulation just mentioned and a transcript of the docket of the Alhambra Municipal Court in the misdemeanor case. Officer Woodring testified that while the three men were in the rest room he suspected a felony was in progress: “I didn’t feel that they were in there to do things that people normally do in restrooms.” The magistrate at the close of the preliminary hearing in the felony case said: “Well, as to Ayala, he had paraphernalia in his presence which is ordinarily used by heroin users. He is found in the immediate presence of someone who has heroin in his possession and also has a kit. He also spent 45 minutes, which up to now is unaccounted for—or 35 minutes, excuse me, in a men’s toilet, and although we didn’t have any expert testimony on the subject matter, I believe that there is a reasonable inference that they were there for something other than washing their hands.” After conviction in the superior court and upon the hearing of application for probation the subject of addiction was discussed but probation was denied.
Certainly the possession and the addiction were contemporaneous in this instance. The addiction conviction rested upon the incidents above recited, not some earlier or later episode. It is not necessary to the application of section 654, Penal Code, that the one act be an integral part of the other. There need be only ‘1 co-operative acts constituting but one offense . . . committed by the same person at the same time [which] when combined, charge but one crime. . . .” What is a single offense is to be determined under People v. Brown, supra, 49 Cal.2d 577, 591, by solving the question whether “a course of conduct” violating more than one statute “comprised a divisible transaction.” I think it highly technical to hold that this addiction and possession form parts of a severable transaction. There is nothing in the record to raise an inference that defendant’s possession had any purpose other than satisfying his craving for the drug. For aught *57that appears he is a victim of narcotics, not a “pusher.” In reality this appellant offended society but once on this occasion, and he should not be punished for a misdemeanor and then punished again for a felony where both convictions are based upon the one episode, a single indivisible series of events. The instant situation is factually analogous to People v. Roberts, supra, 40 Cal.2d 483, 491; People v. Branch, supra, 119 Cal.App.2d 490, 496, and People v. Tenney, supra, 162 Cal.App.2d 458, 463-464, in which it was held that possession and transportation for purpose of sale and the sale itself are but a single offense and punishable but once.
Section 654, Penal Code, not only forbids double punishment but also precludes a second prosecution in a situation such as we have here; it says: “ [A]n acquittal or conviction and sentence under either one bars a prosecution for the same act or omission under any other. ...” Appellant was convicted and sentenced upon the misdemeanor charge and it was thereafter unlawful to prosecute him in this felony case.
The judgment at bar should be reversed with instructions to dismiss the information.
A petition for a rehearing was denied February 2, 1959. Ashburn, J., was of the opinion that the petition should be granted. Appellant’s petition for a hearing by the Supreme Court was denied March 4, 1959.

Pen. Code, § 654: “An act or omission which is made punishable in different ways by different provisions of this code may be punished under either of such provisions, but in no case can it be punished under more than one; an acquittal or conviction and sentence under either one bars a prosecution for the same act or omission under any other. . . .”