Court Opinion

ID: 9602421
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 01:54:40.900525+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T10:50:18.638666
License: Public Domain

RICHARDSON, J.
I concur in the judgment. On October 4, 1975, when defendant committed the brutal crime for which he was convicted, no valid death penalty law existed in this state. The 1973 legislation which had imposed a mandatory sentence of death under compulsion of the United States Supreme Court decision in Gregg v. Georgia (1976) 428 U.S. 153 [49 L.Ed.2d 859, 96 S.Ct. 2909], was held by us in 1976 to be *120invalid because of its failure to provide adequate standards to guide the sentencing authority in its determination whether or not to impose the ultimate sanction. (Rockwell v. Superior Court (1976) 18 Cal.3d 420, 428, 445 [134 Cal.Rptr. 650, 556 P.2d 1101].)
The 1977 legislation, which was enacted to remedy the defects in the 1973 statute, was made effective “immediately in order to guarantee the public the protection inherent in an operative death penalty law.” (Stats. 1977, ch. 316, § 26.) The operative date of the 1977 death penalty law was August 11, 1977. I do not know whether the Legislature intended the statute to apply to crimes committed before August 11, 1977. Similarly, I do not know, as contended by the dissent, “that the Legislature intended the 1977 death penalty statute to have retroactive effect.” (Post, p. 126.) What is certain is that nowhere in the 26 sections of the enabling act (Stats. 1977, ch. 316) nor in the statutory amendments, is there any provision which purports to apply the new law retroactively to crimes which were committed before its enactment. What is equally clear is that section 3 of the Penal Code provides that no part of the Penal Code “is retroactive, unless expressly so declared.” (Italics added.)
It is argued that section 3 must be interpreted in accordance with our reasoning in In re Estrada (1965) 63 Cal.2d 740, 746 [48 Cal.Rptr. 172, 408 P.2d 908], and in In re Marriage of Bouquet (1976) 16 Cal.3d 583, 587-588 [128 Cal.Rptr. 427, 546 P.2d 1371]. While it is true that Estrada (a conviction for escape without force or violence after conviction of being under the influence of narcotics, a misdemeanor) and Bouquet (a marriage dissolution case involving the nature of earnings and accumulations of a husband after separation from his wife) have some application, in my opinion a death penalty case is unique in the law. It is sui generis. In a capital case broad abstract principles lifted from other contexts have less persuasive force. This is because the ultimate punishment, of course, is fixed, final and irrevocable permitting no margin for error. I find no provision of the 1977 death penalty law which “expressly” declares that it is to be given retroactive effect.
Focusing on the intent of the Legislature, therefore, I conclude that it is not clear that the Legislature by providing that the death penalty law was to “go into immediate effect’ means that the law was to apply to crimes previously committed.
The holding in this case affects only a limited number of persons, namely, those whose offenses were committed before August 11, 1977, the *121effective date of the 1977 death penalty legislation. The constitutionality of the 1977 law is not before us.