Court Opinion

ID: 9531542
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 04:12:47.456519+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:28:30.577056
License: Public Domain

*568MOSK, J.
I dissent. I agree with the Court of Appeal in this case, and with the courts in People v. Jones (1988) 203 Cal.App.3d 456 [249 Cal.Rptr. 840] and People v. Green (1982) 134 Cal.App.3d 587 [184 Cal.Rptr. 652], that an abstract of judgment may not be converted, through operation of the official duty presumption (Evid. Code, § 664), into proof that defendant completed a prior prison term for purposes of sentence enhancement under Penal Code section 667.5.
The official duty presumption has been used typically in order to prove trivial inferences made from well-established facts. For example, the official duty presumption may be used to prove that a prisoner who was duly sentenced and incarcerated was lawfully confined. (People v. Lilyroth (1959) 173 Cal.App.2d 94, 97 [342 P.2d 525].) Or it may be used to establish that a prisoner redelivered to the state by federal authorities was properly and lawfully delivered. (People v. Stoliker (1961) 192 Cal.App.2d 263, 267 [13 Cal.Rptr. 437] [applying the predecessor statute, Code Civ. Proc., § 1963, subd. 15].)
In this case, however, the majority would permit the unwarranted expansion of the official duty presumption. They would allow the presumption, in combination with documents that show that defendant had been delivered to prison after being duly convicted, to prove that a prisoner actually completed his prison term. Yet the interval between the defendant’s delivery to prison, and the time when a prisoner’s service is deemed to be completed is usually measured in years. During that time numerous events may occur which could interrupt the completion of the prison sentence, and thus change the nature of his warden’s official duty. For example, the defendant’s sentence may be recalled under Penal Code section 1170, subdivision (d), or it may be reversed on appeal; defendant may receive a pardon or commutation, or he may escape.
Therefore, while the abstract of judgment and commitment form, together with the official duty presumption, can be used to prove that the defendant was indeed properly incarcerated, use of these documents to prove that defendant actually completed his prison term would enlarge the reach of the official duty presumption beyond the extremely modest evidentiary role it was intended to perform, thereby relieving the prosecutor of the burden of proving an element of the enhancement. It is extremely dubious that the Legislature intended the official duty presumption to be used in this expansive manner, especially given that it has already provided the prosecution with the readily available means to prove the completion of defendant’s prison term in the form of a prison packet (Pen. Code, § 969b).
*569For all of the foregoing, I would affirm the judgment of the Court of Appeal.
Kennard, J., concurred.