Court Opinion

ID: 9744770
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 22:15:31.800823+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:24:51.515690
License: Public Domain

HAERLE, J., Dissenting.
My distinguished colleagues effectively concede that their ruling runs counter to three rulings of our sister courts in, in *53chronological order, People v. Couch (1996) 48 Cal.App.4th 1053, 1056-1058 [56 Cal.Rptr.2d 220], People v. Cunningham (1996) 49 Cal.App.4th 1044,1047-1048 [57 Cal.Rptr.2d 179], review denied, and People v. Cepeda (1996) 49 Cal.App.4th 1235, 1237-1240 [57 Cal.Rptr.2d 246]. The only difference between those cases and this is that here the plea contemplated a range of possible sentences and in those three cases there was an agreed-upon term. The Attorney General argues that the result in the three cited cases governs here, as the appellant “received considerable benefit from the bargain.” Indeed he did: Two counts were stricken as was a prison-term prior. (Pen. Code, § 667.5.)
My colleagues, however, find the Attorney General’s “focus on the benefit of the bargain unhelpful,” and go on to say that there is always a bargain in a plea agreement and the real questions are “[w]hat was the bargain” and did it preclude a striking of a prior under People v. Superior Court (Romero) (1996) 13 Cal.4th 497 [53 Cal.Rptr.2d 789, 917 P.2d 628] (Romero). (Maj. opn., ante, at p. 51.)
I part company with the majority right here: We are not mind readers, and I simply despair of a court such as ours successfully fathoming “what was the bargain” in any meaningful way in this or any other case. Indeed, trying to do so is necessarily an exercise in futility because, among other things, the parties will almost surely have different views regarding what their bargain encompassed and what it didn’t. For example, here the majority wants to know if the bargain “preclud[ed] a striking under RomeroT (Maj. opn., ante, at p. 51.) I submit the answer to this is, absent an explicit record on the point, pretty obvious: A defendant who did not anticipate Romero will always say, “no, of course it didn’t” whereas the prosecutor and Attorney General will always say, “yes, of course it did” and we are no closer to any sort of logical resolution.
The peril of trying to infer the nuances of the parties’ “bargain” is illustrated here. The majority concedes that the “terms of the bargain here, as affecting a motion to strike, are not expressed.” It then proceeds to analyze various details of the record and conclude that it is “ambiguous.” (Maj. opn., ante, at pp. 51-52.) But it then finds the elusive answer to its “what was the bargain” question in, and only in, the fact that appellant argued a motion to strike without any objection by the prosecution that such a motion was contrary to the plea agreement! I respectfully suggest that this analysis underscores the futility of an appellate court trying to divine the “intent” underlying a trial court plea bargain: patently the prosecution’s silence could just as easily be attributable to a veritable host of other considerations, e.g., it thought defense counsel was making a mess of things, the trial court’s attitude toward the defendant was visible, it was late in the day, etc., etc.
*54Unlike the majority, I find the resolution of this issue in the ancient epigram about the problems inherent in eating one’s cake and having it, too. Everyone and his brother (at least in the California criminal law arena) knew of the uncertainty surrounding the Romero issue in the several years between passage of the “Three Strikes” law and the issuance of that Supreme Court opinion in mid-1996. And, two months before that decision came down, these parties most certainly did, as the majority explicitly acknowledges. (Maj. opn., ante, at p. 52.) Plea bargains are, by definition, arrangements entered into by opposing parties to achieve certainty in an otherwise uncertain environment. That “uncertain environment” includes, I submit, all extant uncertainties, in this case Romero-based uncertainties. I submit that simple justice dictates that those who, during the pre-Romero period of uncertainty, entered into a plea agreement, whether for a specified term or a range of possible terms, are “stuck" with that deal and cannot now be heard to demand a remand. Hence, I respectfully dissent.
Respondent’s petition for review by the Supreme Court was denied February 25, 1998. Baxter, J., was of the opinion that the petition should be granted.