Court Opinion

ID: 9538311
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 07:34:41.619753+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T14:57:44.065979
License: Public Domain

RICHARDSON, J.
I respectfully dissent.
Penal Code section 1382 requires that a person charged with a felony be brought to trial within 60 days of the filing of charges in the superior court. However, the section also contains this proviso: “[A]n action shall not not be dismissed under this subdivision if it is set for trial on a date beyond the 60-day period at the request of the defendant or with his consent, express dr implied, or because of his neglect or failure to appear and if the defendant is brought to trial on the date so set for trial or within 10 days thereafter.” (Italics added.)
*254Before the majority’s decision, in interpreting section 1382 California courts had uniformly held that any period of delay which was requested by the defendant must be deducted from the 60-day period in determining compliance with the statute. This is wholly logical and reasonable. On principle, why should the defendant not be charged with the continuances or extensions requested by him and which serve his convenience and purposes? Thus, in People v. Harrison (1960) 182 Cal.App.2d 758 [6 Cal.Rptr. 345], the court applied section 1382 to a case wherein 69 days elapsed between the filing of the information and the commencement of trial. The court sustained the position urged by the then Attorney General and affirmed defendant’s conviction, concluding that “16 days of the total of 69 days were requested by the defendant and must be deducted therefrom, leaving a balance of 53 days, a time well within the 60-day limit. ...” (P. 759.) The Harrison court cited with approval an earlier opinion of Justice Peters in People v. Martinelli (1953) 118 Cal.App.2d 94, 96 [257 P.2d 37].
The following year, again at the Attorney General’s urging, the same principles were confirmed in People v. Burch (1961) 196 Cal.App.2d 754, 761-762 [17 Cal.Rptr. 102].
Seven years later Justice Hufstedler, writing in People v. Flores (1968.) 262 Cal.App.2d 313 [68 Cal.Rptr. 669], faced with a 112-day lapse between the filing of charges and date of trial noted that “[T]here must be deducted from those days 63 days. . . attributable to a continuance upon defense counsel’s motion, with the consent of the defendant, leaving a balance of 49 days, a time well within the 60-day limit.” (P. 320.)
Finally, in 1969 Justice Donald Wright speaking again for a unanimous court in People v. Conway (1969) 271 Cal.App.2d 15, 22 [76 Cal.Rptr. 251], confronted by a 65-day lapse between the filing of the information and trial, deducted a 14-day delay requested by defendant in determining that defendant was brought to trial within the 60-day period required by section 1382.
Harrison, Burch, Flores, and Conway pointed the clear direction of California law. There was no ambiguity or uncertainty. Significantly, we unanimously denied a hearing in Harrison, Burch and Conway. There was not a single dissenting voice in the four cases. Three more appellate cases, again without a dissenter, have relied on Harrison: Hankla v. Municipal Court (1972) 26 Cal.App.3d 342, 361 [102 Cal. *255Rptr. 896]; People v. Addison (1967) 256 Cal.App.2d 18, 22, footnote 2 [63 Cal.Rptr. 626]; and Dulsky v. Municipal Court (1966) 242 Cal.App.2d 288, 292 [51 Cal.Rptr. 381]. The majority thus by one stroke disapproves and reverses seven unanimous, carefully reasoned, consistent appellate opinions decided within the past twenty years.
The reason given by the majority for its abrupt judicial U-turn in California law, apparently, is the sudden discovery that the appellate justices in each of these 7 cases have either overlooked, forgotten, or “did not take into account” the 10-day limitation provision of section 1382. With due deference, I suggest that in unsettling this firmly established rule, the majority is transparently wrong. The majority’s view is that, because of the section’s legislative history, even though the defendant has contributed to a delay which extends beyond the 60-day period, the case must be tried within 10 days after his delay ceases without deducting from the 60-day period any time period attributed to defendant. The majority’s argument is fully and cogently answered, however, by Presiding Justice Files in his opinion for the Court of Appeal in this case: “There are two answers to this contention: [¶] First, all 4 of the cases cited above [i.e., Harrison, Burch, Flores, and Conway] which held that the defendant’s delay is not counted in the 60-day period, were decided after the 1959 amendment [to § 1382, adding the 10-day provision] became effective, and none so interpreted the statute. [IT] Second, the 1959 amendment does not purport to affect the manner in which the 60-day period is counted. The 10-day provision, added in 1959, is an exception to the otherwise applicable 60-day limitation. It is an exception which applies after the expiration of the 60 days allowed by the preceding clause.” (Fn. omitted.)
In similar fashion the majority wholly fails in its attempt to find some inconsistency between the established line of authorities heretofore described and Townsend v. Superior Court (1975) 15 Cal.3d 774 [126 Cal.Rptr. 251, 543 P.2d 619]. In Townsend our attention was wholly focused on the 10-day grace period contemplated by section 1382, subdivision 2. This readily appears throughout our discussion on pages 782-783 of the opinion. As we stated, “When, through counsel, he objected on that day to any further continuance, the critical 10-day period commenced.” (Italics added, p. 783.) In Townsend, we rejected the defendant’s speedy trial claim, on the basis (among others) that trial was properly set within the 10-day grace period following defendant’s objection to further continuances. Having rejected defendant’s claim on that ground, we had no occasion whatever to explore the further ques*256tion whether the initial 60-day period might have been tolled during the period of defendant’s own delay. The point was simply not before us in Townsend. As the majority opinion itself acknowledges, “The issue was not expressly considered,” in that case. (Ante, p. 247, fn. 8.)
Moreover, I am unable to accept the majority’s premise that the approximately 20 different appellate justices who, over a period of 20 years, have examined this problem following adoption of section 1382, subdivision 2, were insensitive to or ignored the 1959 amendment. A fair reading of these opinions gives no hint whatever that such was the case. Nor, contrary to the majority, from a policy standpoint do I foresee the reduction of any potential “gamesmanship” by permitting defendant to consume perhaps the greater part of the 60-day period with his own requested continuances thus forcing a trial, regardless of circumstances, within the unexpired portion of the statutory period upon pain of dismissal of the criminal charges.
I fully share in the reasoning of Justice Tobriner, the author of Burch, who in properly rejecting another defendant’s identical argument, concluded that it would be “anomalous. . .that a delay to which he contributed,. . . defeated his constitutional and statutory right to a speedy trial.” (P. 762.) This analysis is correct, and when logical consistency is coupled with principles of reciprocal fairness and common sense we should not unsettle a sound rule so firmly established.
Because I would hold that the 60-day period was extended by defendant’s own requests for continuances, I would not reach the question of whether good cause existed for the People’s own delay in bringing the case to trial.
I would deny the peremptory writ.
Clark, J., concurred.