Court Opinion

ID: 9787796
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-31 00:24:32.443719+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:37:00.490753
License: Public Domain

KENNARD, J., Dissenting.
Penal Code section 186.10, subdivision (c)(1)(D), requires that in sentencing a defendant convicted of money laundering, a trial court must impose an additional four-year prison term if the value of the unlawful transactions exceeded $2.5 million. Although defendant here was not convicted of money laundering, the majority concludes that the trial court properly imposed an additional four-year term to be served consecutive to defendant’s two-year prison sentence for the crime of conspiracy. I disagree. Analysis of the wording of the statutory provisions at issue, comparison of that wording with analogous sentencing laws, and review of the legislative history of the money laundering statute leave me *407highly doubtful that the Legislature intended for the additional prison term for high-value money laundering transactions to attach to a sentence for the crime of conspiracy. Under the mle of lenity, doubts of this magnitude and nature must be resolved in defendant’s favor.
Subdivision (a) of Penal Code section 186.10 defines the crime of money laundering and states that it “shall be punished by imprisonment in a county jail for not more than one year or in the state prison . . . .” When a crime is made punishable by imprisonment in state prison, and the term is not otherwise specified, the state prison term may be 16 months (the lower term), two years (the middle term), or three years (the upper term). (Pen. Code, § 18.) Thus, the punishments that a trial court may impose for the crime of money laundering, without more, are imprisonment in a county jail for one year or imprisonment in the state prison for a term of 16 months, two years, or three years. If the trial court imposes a state prison sentence, rather than a county jail sentence, the crime is a felony. (Pen. Code, § 17, subd. (a).)
The money laundering statute, Penal Code section 186.10, further states, in subdivision (c)(1), that when a person is “punished under subdivision (a) [of the same section] by imprisonment in the state prison,” that person “shall also be subject to an additional term of imprisonment,” if the value of the money laundering transaction or transactions exceeds certain monetary amounts. If the value of the transaction or transactions exceeds $2.5 million, the additional term of imprisonment is four years. (Pen. Code, § 186.10, subd. (c)(1)(D).) Under California's determinate sentencing laws, additional terms of this sort are known as enhancements. (Cal. Rules of Court, rule 4.405(c); People v. Briceno (2004) 34 Cal.4th 451, 460, fn. 7 [20 Cal.Rptr.3d 418, 99 P.3d 1007].)
Having reviewed the relevant punishment provisions for the crime of money laundering, including the sentence enhancements for high-value transactions, I now turn to the punishment provisions for the crime of conspiracy.
Under subdivision (a) of Penal Code section 182, when “two or more persons conspire” to commit a felony, they “shall be punishable in the same manner and to the same extent as is provided for the punishment of that felony.” Under this provision, therefore, a person convicted of conspiracy to engage in felony money laundering is to be punished “in the same manner and to the same extent as is provided for the punishment of’ felony money laundering. This necessarily includes the alternative prison terms of 16 months, two years, or three years prescribed by subdivision (a) of Penal Code section 186.10. But does it also include the high-value-transaction enhancements under subdivision (c) of that section? That is the issue here.
*408When resolving an issue of statutory construction, a court’s goal is to ascertain and effectuate the intent of the enacting legislative body, and the first step is to examine the statutory text, which is generally the most reliable indicator of legislative intent, giving the words their usual and ordinary meaning. (People v. Hernandez (2003) 30 Cal.4th 835, 865 [134 Cal.Rptr.2d 602, 69 P.3d 446].) If the statutory language is unambiguous, in the sense that it is not reasonably susceptible of more than one meaning on the question at issue, a court generally adopts that construction without further inquiry or analysis. (People v. Gardeley (1996) 14 Cal.4th 605, 621 [59 Cal.Rptr.2d 356, 927 P.2d 713].) If the language is ambiguous, a court may consult extrinsic sources and use a variety of interpretive techniques and construction rules to resolve the ambiguity. (People v. Jefferson (1999) 21 Cal.4th 86, 94 [86 Cal.Rptr.2d 893, 980 P.2d 441].)
On the question at issue here, Penal Code section 182 would be unambiguous if it expressly stated, for example, that conspiracy to commit a felony is punishable “in the same manner and to the same extent” as the target felony is punishable, “including any enhancement.” Language like that appears in the “Three Strikes” law, which provides that the minimum term for an indeterminate life term imposed on a third strike defendant is the greatest of three alternatives, one of which is “[t]he term ... for the underlying conviction, including any enhancement . . . .” (Pen. Code, § 667, subd. (e)(2)(A)(iii), italics added.) The absence of similar wording in Penal Code section 182, although not conclusive, is sufficient to raise a doubt about the underlying legislative intent.
The provision of Penal Code section 182 making conspiracy to commit a felony punishable “in the same manner and to the same extent as is provided for the punishment of that felony” is reasonably susceptible of more than one meaning. It could mean either that conspiracy to commit a felony is punishable in the same manner and to the same extent as the target felony alone, excluding punishments that a trial court may impose only when the trier of fact has made additional findings beyond the essential elements of the target felony itself, or it could mean that conspiracy to commit a felony is punishable by the full range of punishments available for the target felony, including punishments that may be imposed only after additional findings are made. Neither of these constructions, however, is entirely and unfailingly correct.
Conspiracy to commit a felony is not always punishable by the full range of punishments available for the target felony, including punishments that may be imposed only after additional findings are made. For example, the full range of punishments for murder includes death and imprisonment for life without possibility of parole (Pen. Code, § 190, subd. (a)), yet neither of *409those punishments may be imposed for a conspiracy to commit murder. (People v. Hernandez, supra, 30 Cal.4th at pp. 865-870.) But neither is it correct to say that the punishments that may be imposed for conspiracy to commit a felony are limited to those that could be imposed for the target felony alone and may never include punishments that could be imposed only upon the mating of additional findings. For example, Health and Safety Code section 11370.4 establishes enhancements for certain felonies involving illegal drugs, based on the weight of the illegal drug involved in the crime, and it expressly makes these enhancements applicable to anyone “convicted of a violation of, or of a conspiracy to violate” any of the listed drug offenses. (Health & Saf. Code, § 11370.4, subds. (a), (b), italics added.)
What conclusions may one draw about the proper interpretation of Penal Code section 182’s provision mating conspiracy to commit a felony punishable “in the same manner and to the same extent as is provided for the punishment of that felony”? The conclusions one must draw are, first, that the punishments a court may impose for conspiracy to commit a felony sometimes but not always include punishments, such as enhancements, that require findings beyond the essential elements of the target felony itself, and, second, that whether a court may impose an enhanced or increased punishment of this sort requires construction and analysis of the punishment provisions relating to the target felony. Accordingly, I turn my attention to the punishment provisions for the crime of money laundering.
On the question at issue here, Penal Code section 186.10, subdivision (c), would be unambiguous if it expressly stated, for example, that the transaction-value enhancements applied not only to the crime of money laundering, but also to the crime of conspiracy to engage in money laundering. As .1 mentioned earlier, language like that appears in the statutory provisions that establish weight enhancements for certain illegal drug crimes and make those enhancements expressly applicable to anyone “convicted of a . . . conspiracy to violate” any of the listed drug offenses. (Health & Saf. Code, § 11370.4, subds. (a), (b).) The absence of similar wording in Penal Code section 186.10, subdivision (c), although not conclusive, is sufficient to raise a doubt that the Legislature intended that the money laundering high-value enhancements could be applied to a conviction for conspiracy. This doubt derives from the rule of statutory construction that when the Legislature uses a critical word or phrase in one statute, the omission of that word or phrase in another statute dealing with the same general subject generally shows a different legislative intent. (In re Jennings (2004) 34 Cal.4th 254, 273 [17 Cal.Rptr.3d 645, 95 P.3d 906]; In re Young (2004) 32 Cal.4th 900, 907 [12 Cal.Rptr.3d 48, 87 P.3d 797].)
Like the majority, I have reviewed the legislative history of Penal Code section 186.10 relating to the high-value-transaction enhancements for money *410laundering. But I find nothing in the available documents showing that the Legislature considered whether those enhancements should apply to conspiracy convictions or that it formed or expressed any intent on that question.
The majority relies in part on People v. Kramer (2002) 29 Cal.4th 720 [128 Cal.Rptr.2d 407, 59 P.3d 738], in which this court construed the language of Penal Code section 654 stating that “[a]n act or omission that is punishable in different ways by different provisions of law shall be punished under the provision that provides for the longest potential term of imprisonment. . . .” (Italics added.) Relying on the statute’s purpose and legislative history, as well as its wording, this court concluded that the italicized words included enhancements. (People v. Kramer, at pp. 723-724.) But very similar language in another provision of the Penal Code has received a very different construction. For a defendant with one prior conviction that qualifies as a “strike,” the Three Strikes law provides that “the determinate term . . . shall be twice the term otherwise provided as punishment for the current felony.” (Pen. Code, § 667, subd. (e)(1).) The italicized language in this provision has been construed as not including enhancements. (People v. Hardy (1999) 73 Cal.App.4th 1429, 1433 [87 Cal.Rptr.2d 278, 87 Cal.Rptr.2d 279]; People v. Dominguez (1995) 38 Cal.App.4th 410, 424 [45 Cal.Rptr.2d 153].) Thus, consideration of similar language in other sentencing laws provides no conclusive or satisfactory resolution of the ambiguity at issue here.
The majority also relies in part on the wording of subdivision (c) of Penal Code section 186.10, the money-laundering statute, which states that the high-value-transaction enhancements apply to anyone “who is punished under subdivision (a) by imprisonment in the state prison.” (Italics added.) The majority adopts as its own the People’s argument that a person who is convicted of conspiracy to engage in money laundering, and who is sentenced to state prison for that crime, has necessarily been punished “under” subdivision (a) of Penal Code section 186.10. Well, yes and no. Because the conspiracy statute requires that persons convicted of that crime be punished “in the same manner and to the same extent” as persons convicted of the target crime, one could say, with equal accuracy, that a defendant who has received a state prison sentence for money laundering has been punished “under” the money-laundering statute or “under” the conspiracy statute. The language is reasonably susceptible of either meaning.
In this situation, I would apply the rule of lenity, a rule of construction for laws relating to crimes and punishments. That rule states that when “two reasonable interpretations of the same provision stand in relative equipoise, i.e., . . . resolution of the statute’s ambiguities in a convincing manner is impracticable,” a court adopts the interpretation that is more favorable to the defendant. (People v. Jones (1988) 46 Cal.3d 585, 599 [250 Cal.Rptr. 635, *411758 P.2d 1165]; accord, People v. Hernandez, supra, 30 Cal.4th at p. 869.) Because the statutory provisions at issue here are ambiguous, and this ambiguity cannot otherwise be convincingly resolved, I would construe them as not allowing a court to impose a high-value-transaction enhancement when the defendant has not been convicted of money laundering, but instead of conspiracy to engage in money laundering.
For this reason, I would reverse the Court of Appeal’s judgment.
Moreno, J., concurred.