Court Opinion

ID: 9690309
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 19:04:14.94781+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:03:40.460879
License: Public Domain

Filed 8/24/23 P. v. Ackerman CA3
                                           NOT TO BE PUBLISHED
California Rules of Court, rule 8.1115(a), prohibits courts and parties from citing or relying on opinions not certified for
publication or ordered published, except as specified by rule 8.1115(b). This opinion has not been certified for publication
or ordered published for purposes of rule 8.1115.

                IN THE COURT OF APPEAL OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA
                                      THIRD APPELLATE DISTRICT
                                                     (Sacramento)
                                                            ----

 THE PEOPLE,                                                                                   C096054

                    Plaintiff and Respondent,                                      (Super. Ct. No. 09F04484)

           v.

 JEREMY DALE ACKERMAN,

                    Defendant and Appellant.

         Defendant Jeremy Dale Ackerman appeals the trial court’s order denying his
petition for resentencing after an evidentiary hearing pursuant to Penal Code
section 1172.6, subdivision (d).1 “At such a hearing, the prosecution is tasked with

1 Effective June 30, 2022, the Legislature renumbered former section 1170.95 as
section 1172.6. (Stats. 2022, ch. 58, § 10.) There were no substantive changes to the
statute. Although defendant filed his petition under former section 1170.95, we cite the
current section 1172.6 throughout this opinion.

Undesignated section references are to the Penal Code.

                                                             1
proving ‘beyond a reasonable doubt, that the petitioner is guilty of murder or attempted
murder under California law as amended by the changes to sections 188 or 189 made
effective January 1, 2019.’ [Citation.]” (People v. Burgess (2023) 88 Cal.App.5th 592,
595.) On appeal, defendant contends the trial court “applied the wrong evidentiary
standard at the section 1172.6, subdivision (d)(3) hearing.” We disagree and affirm.
                   FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND
        A jury previously found defendant “guilty of first degree murder, burglary, and
robbery. On the murder count, the jury found true the allegation that [defendant]
personally used a deadly and dangerous weapon, a knife (§ 12022, subd. (b)(1)) and the
felony-murder special circumstances allegations that [defendant] committed the murder
while engaged in the commission of robbery and burglary (§ 190.2, subd. (a)(17)(A),
(G)).
        “The trial court sentenced [defendant] to life in state prison without possibility of
parole for the first degree special-circumstance murder. The court imposed and stayed
sentence on the remaining counts and allegations.” (People v. Ackerman (Dec. 8, 2016,
C065484) [nonpub. opn.].) Defendant appealed, and we affirmed his conviction. (Ibid.)
        In 2019, defendant filed a petition under section 1172.6. The trial court issued an
order to show cause and held an evidentiary hearing pursuant to section 1172.6,
subdivision (d)(3). At the hearing, the trial court admitted the “appellate transcripts” and
defendant testified. After evidence and argument from counsel, the court said: “there is
. . . no question that the law, having changed since the trial resulting in your conviction,
were this case tried again tomorrow with the change of law, statutory changes and then
Banks and Clark and other appellate holdings – which are contextualized in CALCRIM
[No.] 703 – in which jurors would now, were we to try this case, be instructed to consider
a number of factors in assessing whether you are a murderer on the facts presented.”
        The trial court then went through each of the factors in CALCRIM No. 703
(Special Circumstances: Intent Requirement for Accomplice – Felony Murder). The

                                              2
court found that defendant knew that more than one weapon, including lethal weapons,
were at the scene and/or were likely to be used: there was a knife, a two-by-four (or
skateboard) that defendant used to strike the first blow, garden shears, and a gun.
Defendant also was near the victim when the victim was killed and had the opportunity to
intervene but did not. The crime resulting in the murder went on for a long period of
time (the court suggested it could have been “tried as a torture murder”), and defendant
made no effort to minimize “the possibility of violence.” “And then, the most significant
factor of all, to the Court, is that you personally stabbed the victim, whether it was two
times or three times.
       “I think that [the prosecutor] is correct, that a jury could easily have found beyond
a reasonable doubt that this was a crime of murder, of premeditation, because you
personally, knowing that the victim was utterly without defense, abjectly vulnerable,
largely as a consequence of your own efforts and actions in tying him up, putting a
pillowcase over his sock-gagged face, you stabbed him multiple times, whether it was
two or three.
       “The only thing that makes that seem somehow not as consequential, as it would
be in the typical murder case resulting from a stabbing, is the extraordinary number of
wounds inflicted by [the codefendant].
       “So there isn’t any question on the record here that this would be, and is, a first
degree murder with special circumstances, regardless of the change of law.” The court
concluded, “There’s no question that your role was major in this crime, that you were so
significant a factor in this case that but for your involvement, [the victim] would still be
alive.” The trial court denied defendant’s petition accordingly.
       Defendant appeals.
                                       DISCUSSION
       Defendant contends the trial court applied the wrong evidentiary standard at his
section 1172.6, subdivision (d)(3) hearing. We disagree.

                                              3
       At a section 1172.6, subdivision (d) hearing, the trial judge sits as a fact finder and
must determine whether the People have proven beyond a reasonable doubt that the
defendant is guilty of murder under amended sections 188 and 189. (§ 1172.6, subd.
(d)(3); People v. Clements (2022) 75 Cal.App.5th 276, 294-295.) The trial court does not
merely decide whether there is substantial evidence for a jury to conclude that the
defendant is guilty of murder under a still-valid theory. (Id. at pp. 294-295.)
       “In the absence of evidence to the contrary, we presume that the court ‘knows and
applies the correct statutory and case law.’ [Citations.]” (People v. Thomas (2011)
52 Cal.4th 336, 361.)
       Here, the trial court noted the question presented by the hearing was whether
defendant was “a murderer on the facts presented.” The court then described the relevant
jury instruction for finding that a defendant who was not the actual killer was guilty of
special circumstance murder, and it carefully identified evidence from the record to
support each element of the crime. (See CALCRIM No. 703; see also People v. Lopez
(2022) 78 Cal.App.5th 1, 20.) Based on that evidence, the court found that “but for”
defendant’s role in the attack, the victim would not have been killed, and there was “no
question” that defendant was a major participant in the crime that resulted in the victim’s
death. We thus reasonably interpret the court’s finding to be one of guilt beyond a
reasonable doubt.
       Defendant’s only evidence that the trial court applied the wrong standard is the
court’s statement “ ‘that a jury could easily have found beyond a reasonable doubt that
this was a crime of murder, of premeditation . . . .’ ” But this statement simply validated
what the prosecutor had argued and does not overcome the presumption that the court
knew the law and applied it correctly when read in context of the court’s entire ruling.
Because we find the trial court applied the correct evidentiary standard, we need not
address defendant’s remaining claims on appeal, all of which are premised on a finding
that the trial court applied the wrong standard.

                                              4
                                    DISPOSITION
      The order denying defendant’s petition for resentencing is affirmed.

                                                /s/
                                               MESIWALA, J.

We concur:

 /s/
KRAUSE, Acting P. J.

 /s/
BOULWARE EURIE, J.

                                           5