Court Opinion

ID: 9568954
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 20:08:58.853686+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T11:17:13.655481
License: Public Domain

CHIN, J.
I dissent. The “Three Strikes” law, designed to punish habitual criminals severely, provides much harsher penalties for the recidivist who has committed two or more previous serious or violent crimes, or “strikes,” than for the recidivist who has committed only one previous qualifying crime. Ignoring this central purpose of the law, the majority interprets it so that one previous criminal act or omission may, depending on exactly how the prior crimes were charged, give rise to two or more strikes. To reach this unwarranted result, the majority must also overturn decades of case law designed to protect against multiple punishment for a single act.
In the current offense, defendant shoplifted a carton of cigarettes and was convicted of petty theft with a prior. In 1979, he entered an apartment intending to assault the resident and did so, stabbing her some 20 times. For that atrocious act, he was convicted of (1) burglary for entering the apartment with the intent to assault and (2) assault with intent to commit murder. Although defendant was properly convicted of both crimes, Penal Code section 6541 permits that he be punished only once for them because, under settled legal principles, both convictions were based on a single “act or omission.” Therefore, the trial court in the earlier proceeding imposed punishment for only one of the convictions. Using a procedural device the courts developed to comply with section 654, the court “stayed” the sentence for the other conviction.
The Legislature and electorate have enacted separate but substantially identical Three Strikes laws increasing prison sentences for persons with one strike and increasing them further for persons with two strikes. The majority concludes that because defendant was convicted earlier of two crimes for the same act, he received two strikes at once and is thus subject to a prison term of twenty-five years to life. I cannot agree. Although defendant is a recidivist and deserves the increased punishment the Three Strikes law has reserved for those who commit a crime and then commit another, this is a second strike case, not a third strike case.
In People v. Fuhrman (1997) 16 Cal.4th 930, 937-940 [67 Cal.Rptr.2d 1, 941 P.2d 1189], we held that prior convictions need not have been brought *38and tried separately for each to qualify as a strike. I joined that holding. However, we expressly reserved the distinct issue whether a conviction that could not be separately punished may be a strike in addition to the conviction for which the defendant was punished. (Id. at pp. 936, 941.) Here, I part company with the majority. Section 654 has been the law of California since the early days of statehood. It prohibits multiple punishment for the two prior convictions. A conviction that may not be separately punished does not qualify as a separate strike. We should not transform one strike into two.
To place this issue in perspective, I first present a historical review of section 654 and the procedure the courts adopted to implement it. I then analyze the relevant portions of the Three Strikes law with that perspective in mind.
I. Historical Review
Section 654 was enacted in 1872. Although amended as recently as 1997, it has remained unchanged in relevant respects. It currently provides, as relevant: “An act or omission that is punishable in different ways by different provisions of law shall be punished . . . , but in no case shall the act or omission be punished under more than one provision.” The statute is silent on the procedure to follow when there are multiple convictions that may be punished but once. The courts developed that procedure.
The question the courts faced was how to guarantee a defendant would not receive multiple punishment in violation of section 654 without giving that defendant an undeserved windfall. Generally, the Legislature has permitted multiple conviction even when multiple punishment is prohibited. “An accusatory pleading may charge two or more different offenses connected together in their commission, or different statements of the same offense .... The prosecution is not required to elect between the different offenses or counts set forth in the accusatory pleading, but the defendant may be convicted of any number of the offenses charged . . . .” (§ 954.) As we explained in People v. Pearson (1986) 42 Cal.3d 351, 354 [228 Cal.Rptr. 509, 721 P.2d 595] (Pearson), “Section 954 sets forth the general rule that defendants may be charged with and convicted of multiple offenses based on a single act or an indivisible course of conduct.” The courts had to decide how to treat multiple convictions that could be punished but once. Setting aside all but one of the convictions would be unwise because, if that conviction were ever vacated for any reason, the others would not be available to replace it. The courts struggled with this question in the decade of the 1960’s.
Early cases were inconsistent in their treatment of cases covered by section 654. Some simply set aside the excess conviction. (See People v. *39McFarland (1962) 58 Cal.2d 748, 763 [26 Cal.Rptr. 473, 376 P.2d 449].) However, as we noted in McFarland, “section 654 proscribes double punishment, not double conviction . . . .” {Id. at p. 762.) In McFarland, because “[t]he appropriate procedure ... is to eliminate the effect of the judgment as to the lesser offense insofar as the penalty alone is concerned,” we “reversed [the judgment] insofar as it imposes a sentence for grand theft, and in all other respects” affirmed. {Id. at p. 763.) The modem procedure of staying the impermissible punishment had not yet developed.
That procedure was first used in People v. Niles (1964) 227 Cal.App.2d 749 [39 Cal.Rptr. 11] {Niles). In Niles, the trial court did what has become the standard; it “stay[ed]” sentence on the lesser offense. The appellate court considered whether that procedure satisfied section 654’s prohibition against multiple punishment. In a thoughtful discussion that established the legal foundation for future section 654 jurisprudence, the court found the “stay” did satisfy section 654. Citing McFarland, the court first noted that section 654 only proscribes multiple punishment, not multiple conviction. {Niles, supra, 227 Cal.App.2d at p. 756.) “It is obvious,” the court stated, “that this rule poses real problems for a trial court at the time of sentence. . . . [I]f it dismisses the count carrying the lesser penalty, and the conviction on the remaining count should be reversed on appeal, the defendant would stand with no conviction at all. ... It follows that the procedure adopted by the trial court in this case was a reasonable—and so far as we can see the only possible—reconciliation of the various policies involved. Any other method either incurs the risk of letting a defendant escape altogether, or else imposes an unnecessary burden on an appellate court and on the trial court on the inevitable remand for correction of sentence. The procedure here affords appellant the maximum protection to which section 654 entitles him and, under no condition, can operate to his prejudice.” {Ibid., italics added.)
We took up the question in In re Wright (1967) 65 Cal.2d 650 [56 Cal.Rptr. 110, 422 P.2d 998]. There, the trial court imposed concurrent sentences for two convictions for which section 654 prohibited multiple punishment. We concluded that concurrent sentencing did not satisfy section 654 because sometimes “concurrent sentences violating section 654 would result in detrimental operation of other statutes that govern punishment.” {In re Wright, supra, 65 Cal.2d at p. 654, fn. omitted.) Foreseeing the issue in this case, we cited the possibility that the concurrent conviction might later be used as a prior conviction as a reason concurrent sentencing violated section 654. {Id. at p. 654, fn. 2.) We cited the then new stay procedure of Niles, supra, 227 Cal.App.2d 749, as a valid method to satisfy section 654. {In re Wright, supra, 65 Cal.2d at pp. 655-656 & fn. 4.) “Although the Legislature has not expressly provided for a stay of execution of sentence in the Niles *40situation, the power to proceed as the trial court did in that case is within the fair import of section 654. As the appellate court there explained (227 Cal.App.2d at p. 756) that procedure reasonably reconciles the policies involved in applying section 654 to protect the rights of both the state and the defendant.” (Id. at p. 656, fn. 4.)
More recently, in Pearson, we considered whether we should “prohibit the use of more than one conviction based on each of [defendant’s] criminal acts for the purpose of enhancing any subsequent sentences he may receive.” (Pearson, supra, 42 Cal.3d at p. 358.) We noted that in In re Wright we “balanced the potential windfall to the defendant of reversing multiple convictions against the prejudice to him of allowing sentencing for such convictions. We then determined that the procedure of staying execution of sentence for multiple convictions instead of reversing such convictions ‘reasonably reconciles the policies involved in applying section 654 to protect the rights of both the state and the defendant,’ and follows logically from the section 654 prohibition against punishing the defendant under more than one provision based on a single criminal act. ([In re Wright, supra, 65 Cal.2d] at pp. 655-656, fn. 4.)” (Pearson, supra, 42 Cal.3d at p. 360.)
We concluded that “Any subsequent sentences imposed on defendant can be enhanced on the basis of the convictions for which he served a sentence; but convictions for which service of sentence was stayed may not be so used unless the Legislature explicitly declares that subsequent penal or administrative action may be based on such stayed convictions.” (Pearson, supra, 42 Cal.3d at p. 361.) We quoted a Court of Appeal opinion “explaining that ‘The practice of staying was accepted as compatible with the prohibition against multiple punishment because it was assumed no incremental punishment can flow from the stayed sentences’ ” (Pearson, supra, 42 Cal.3d at p. 361), and we specifically stated that “if defendant here were subjected to future sentence enhancements based on his stayed convictions, this would also constitute the type of ‘incremental punishment’ that section 654 forbids.” (Id. at p. 362, italics added.)
We also noted that some Court of Appeal decisions were so concerned with the possible erroneous future use of convictions stayed under section 654 that they stayed not only the punishment for the conviction but also use of the conviction as a prior; one case went so far as to set aside the conviction entirely to guard against that possibility. (Pearson, supra, 42 Cal.3d at p. 362.) These cases, we said, “were properly concerned with the potential or actual application of enhancement statutes to stayed convictions. Although it is true that ‘increased penalties for subsequent offenses are attributable to the defendant’s status as a repeat offender and arise as an *41incident of the subsequent offense rather than constituting a penalty for the prior offense’, [citation], a defendant’s status as a repeat offender relates to the number of wrongful acts he committed, not to the number of his convictions. In keeping with our reason for using stays in multiple conviction situations, the defendant is penalized if he suffers enhancements based on stayed convictions. Thus to enhance a defendant’s sentence because of a stayed conviction would constitute multiple punishment and is prohibited by section 654.” (Id. at pp. 362-363, italics added, fn. omitted.)
California courts have consistently followed the Niles stay procedure for the last three decades, believing that the court-created procedure satisfied section 654’s mandate that the stayed conviction “under no condition, can operate to [defendant’s] prejudice” (Niles, supra, 227 Cal.App.2d at p. 756) and would prevent future use of the conviction (In re Wright, supra, 65 Cal.2d at p. 654 & fn. 2; Pearson, supra, 42 Cal.3d 351). This case tests whether this belief was well founded or merely an illusion, and whether 30 years of section 654 jurisprudence was built on a solid foundation or quicksand.
II. The Three Strikes Law
Against this historical backdrop, I consider the Three Strikes statute. The majority’s interpretation means that we, the courts, were wrong the last 30 years in concluding that the stay procedure would protect defendants from having the stayed sentence used as a prior conviction. At the least, the Three Strikes statute should explicitly declare this result before we so conclude. In another case involving section 654, we stressed that “[a]s a general rule of statutory construction, of course, repeal by implication is disfavored. [Citation.] Such repeal is particularly disfavored when, as here, the statute allegedly repealed expresses a legal principle that has been a part of our penal jurisprudence for over a century.” (People v. Siko (1988) 45 Cal.3d 820, 824 [248 Cal.Rptr. 110, 755 P.2d 294].) “[S]ection 654 .. . is presumed to govern every case to which it applies by its terms—unless some other statute creates an express exception.” (Ibid.)
The pertinent language of the Three Strikes law is found in section 1170.12, subdivision (b): “Notwithstanding any other provision of law and for the purposes of this section, a prior conviction of a felony shall be defined as:
“(1) Any offense defined in subdivision (c) of Section 667.5 as a violent felony or any offense defined in subdivision (c) of Section 1192.7 as a serious felony in this state. . . . None of the following dispositions shall *42affect the determination that a prior conviction is a prior felony for purposes of this section:
“(B) The stay of execution of sentence.”
Nothing in this language “explicitly declares” (Pearson, supra, 42 Cal.3d at p. 361) that a conviction for which section 654 prohibits punishment can be a separate strike. One thing is clear: The mere fact the sentence for one of the convictions was stayed does not “affect” its use as a strike. But that is not the question. The sentence here was not merely stayed; it was stayed to comply with section 654’s mandate that the conviction not be used for any penal purpose, including as a prior conviction. Section 654, not the stay, affects the conviction’s use as a strike. It does not violate section 654 to enhance a sentence for a prior conviction because the defendant is being punished for recidivism. (Pearson, supra, 42 Cal.3d at p. 363.) But it does violate that section to enhance a sentence twice, once each for two prior convictions, if the convictions arose from the same act within the meaning of the section. As we explained in Pearson, “a defendant’s status as a repeat offender relates to the number of wrongful acts he committed, not to the number of his convictions.” {Ibid.)
The majority cites the language in Pearson that “convictions for which service of sentence was stayed may not be so used unless the Legislature explicitly declares that subsequent penal or administrative action may be based on such stayed convictions.” {Pearson, supra, 42 Cal.3d at p. 361, quoted in maj. opn., ante, at p. 29.) It concludes the Legislature (or electorate) has explicitly so declared. I disagree. For present purposes, I am willing to assume (but not decide; the implication in Pearson the majority cites was clear dicta, and constitutional due process principles may underlie section 654) that the Legislature may, if it explicitly says so, multiply punish prior convictions even if multiple punishment was prohibited at the time of the convictions. But the mere reference to a stay of execution of sentence is not such an explicit declaration. It is not the stay that affects the conviction’s use as a strike; it is section 654.
The majority also cites the language at the beginning of section 1170.12, subdivision (b): “Notwithstanding any other provision of law and for the purposes of this section, a prior conviction of a felony shall be defined as . . . .” (Italics added.) The italicized language, however, merely refers to the definition of a qualifying conviction. The Penal Code contains a number of definitions of different types of convictions for various purposes. This *43language makes clear that the Three Strikes law has its own definition notwithstanding any other. It falls far short of an explicit declaration that the Three Strikes law has abrogated the fundamental promise that section 654 has made for over a century that a person will not be punished twice for the same act. Nothing in the Three Strikes law says that multiple convictions for which the defendant may be punished but once may be multiple strikes.2
The majority claims support in a committee report. (Maj. opn., ante, at pp. 33-34 & fn. 6, citing Sen. Com. on Judiciary, Analysis of Assem. Bill No. 971 (1993-1994 Reg. Sess.) as amended Jan. 26, 1994, pp. 9-10.) That report does not support the majority. It merely says the prior offenses need not be “separate” to count as strikes. The report is relevant to the brought-and-tried-separately argument we resolved unanimously in People v. Fuhrman, supra, 16 Cal.4th at pages 937-940, but not to the “distinct” {id. at p. 936) issue we reserved for this case. The example in the report illustrates this point. A “ ‘single act of robbery of three people in a store’ ” (maj. opn., ante, at p. 33) is a crime of violence against multiple victims. Section 654 does not prohibit multiple punishment when there are multiple victims. {People v. Latimer (1993) 5 Cal.4th 1203, 1212 [23 Cal.Rptr.2d 144, 858 P.2d 611].) The report addresses a situation where section 654 does not apply. It does not address the issue of this case, where section 654 does apply.
The majority acknowledges the parties have not requested us to judicially notice that committee report in this case. (Maj. opn., ante, at p. 34, fn. 6.) While I have no doubt “we are empowered to do so” {ibid.), the absence of a request is significant. The Attorney General did formally request us to judicially notice that report, but in Fuhrman, not this case. In the Fuhrman request, he stated, correctly, “The document is relevant to the issue . . . whether prior convictions must arise from separate cases in order to be counted as strikes.” The Attorney General, who vigorously argues for two strikes in this case, recognizes that the report is relevant to the issue decided in Fuhrman, but not to the issue of this case.
The question before us has major practical consequences. Multiple convictions can often arise out of a single act. Here, there were two convictions, but there may be even more from one act. As an example, suppose a person stops a pedestrian at knifepoint and demands a watch. Based solely on that act, the person could conceivably be convicted of felony false imprisonment, *44assault with a deadly weapon, and attempted robbery. Because each conviction would involve personal use of a deadly weapon, each could, individually, qualify as a strike. (See § 1192.7, subd. (c)(23).) Would that mean three strikes occur at once? When asked this hypothetical question at oral argument, the Attorney General suggested that the excess convictions in the earlier case might “be dismissed” to avoid multiple strikes. Dismissal, of course, is exactly what should not happen. The purpose behind using the stay mechanism to prevent unlawful multiple punishment was to avoid dismissal. The stayed convictions should be preserved in the event the conviction for which the punishment was imposed was set aside for any reason. Moreover, stay of sentence, rather than dismissal, has been the practice for 30 years; dismissal in the future would not address the problem of the numerous multiple convictions accumulated in the past based on single acts or omissions.
The system of permitting multiple convictions while staying the excess punishment has worked well, at least until now. If the result of today’s holding is that courts dismiss entirely convictions governed by section 654 rather than merely staying the punishment, the prosecution may come to regret its victory.
The majority describes section 654 as affording defendants “leniency.” (Maj. opn., ante, at p. 35.) But section 654 is not a matter of leniency. That provision, part of California law for over a century, codifies a basic notion of our criminal justice system: A person may be punished for criminal activity—indeed, punished severely—but may be punished only once for a single act not involving multiple victims. I do not suggest that because a court was lenient before, it must be lenient again. The court was not lenient before; treating defendant now as a repeat offender is not lenient. But to treat this case as a three strikes case is excessive.
Permitting but one strike per act does not make meaningless the statutory reference to “The stay of execution of sentence.” (§ 1170.12, subd. (b)(1)(B).) There are types of stays other than the one the courts created to comply with section 654. We identified two in In re Wright: a stay when the court grants probation, and a stay pending appeal. (In re Wright, supra, 65 Cal.2d at pp. 655-656, fn. 4.) As the majority recognizes (maj. opn., ante, at p. 32), a stay is permitted if the term exceeds statutory limits or to allow defendants to put their affairs in order. The statute prevents defendants from claiming a conviction was not a strike merely because it was stayed. For example, if a person is convicted of a serious felony and sentenced to state prison, but the court stays the sentence pending appeal, and the person then commits another felony, the earlier conviction could qualify as a strike despite the stay. *45The majority asserts that my interpretation would effectively “replace the phrase ‘[t]he stay of execution of sentence’ [citation] with the words ‘the stay of execution of sentence, except those stays mandated by section 654.’ ” (Maj. opn., ante, at p. 31, majority’s italics.) It would not. I do not rely on the stay but on section 654 itself and its fundamental principle that a person may be punished only once for the same act. The stay was merely a procedural tool the courts devised to comply with that principle. The procedure has existed for about three decades, the principle for over a century. The statute states only that the “dispositionQ” of a stay shall not “affect the determination that a prior conviction is a” strike. (§ 1170.12, subd. (b)(1).) The majority transforms it to read, “if the disposition was a stay of execution of judgment, it must be determined that the prior conviction is a strike.” The statute does not state that a conviction for which execution of sentence was stayed must be a strike; it merely says the stay itself does not preclude its use as a strike.
In the same mode, the majority finds - “irony” in what it asserts to be defendant’s “position” that the word “stay” in section 1170.12, subdivision (b)(1)(B), does not “include a stay issued pursuant to section 654.” (Maj. opn., ante, at p. 31, fn. 5.) I do not understand that to be defendant’s position.3 It is certainly not mine. No stay, itself, affects the determination that a conviction is a strike. The statute is clear in this regard. It says nothing, however, about the prohibition against multiple punishment for the same act.
The majority states, “In our view, the electorate and the Legislature rationally could—and did—conclude that a person who committed additional violence in the course of a prior serious felony (e.g., shooting or pistol-whipping a victim during a robbery, or assaulting a victim during a burglary) should be treated more harshly than an individual who committed the same initial felony, but whose criminal conduct did not include such additional violence.” (Maj. opn., ante, at p. 35.) I agree, except for the implication that my view is somehow different. As noted, I concurred in Fuhrman’s holding that the prior convictions need not be brought and tried separately. Multiple strikes may result from the same incident. Section 654 prohibits multiple punishment for “An act or omission that is punishable in different ways . . .”; it does not prohibit multiple punishment for all crimes committed on one occasion. Courts have permitted multiple punishment for multiple sex crimes against the same victim, for both a robbery and an *46assault of the same victim, for multiple shots fired at the same victim, and, most pertinent here, for both burglary and rape when the burglary was for the purpose of theft. (See People v. Latimer, supra, 5 Cal.4th 1203, 1212, and cases there cited.) In each of these situations, under Fuhrman, multiple strikes would be allowed. In this case, the prior burglary was for the purpose of the assault, not for a different purpose such as theft. There was no criminal intent separate from the assault itself and no “additional” violence. My proposed holding is narrow, limited to those convictions, like these, that section 654 controls.
The majority also states, “The Three Strikes law provided [defendant] with notice that he would be treated as a recidivist if he reoffended.” (Maj. opn., ante, at p. 35.) Again, I fully agree. Defendant is obviously a recidivist; he had full notice he would be treated as one if he reoffended; he is being treated as one. The issue is not whether defendant is a recidivist but whether' he should be punished twice for the same act. Defendant clearly had a strike against him when he stole the cigarettes. The sole question is whether he had two strikes. He did not.
III. Conclusion
Mine is but a modest proposal: A single act that may be punished only once may generate one strike, not two. Defendant was punished for his serious criminal behavior in 1979. He is properly being punished today as a recidivist. However, he has one strike against him, not two. Accordingly, I dissent.
Mosk, J., and Werdegar, J., concurred.

All further statutory references are to the Penal Code.

The majority finds it “difficult... to imagine language clearer” than the language it cites. (Maj. opn., ante, at p. 31.) I find it quite easy to imagine clear language. If the Legislature and electorate had really intended to allow multiple strikes for a single act, they could have used explicit language such as this: “Multiple convictions arising out of the same act or omission shall be multiple strikes.”

Defendant expressly recognizes that “The use of the term ‘stay’ in the three strikes statutes explicitly states that a prior may be used as a ‘strike’ even though execution of sentence was stayed,” but he argues, as do I, that “it is not the ‘stay’ that is at the heart of the rule reiterated in Pearson; it is the multiple use of priors arising from a single criminal ‘act.’ ”