Court Opinion

ID: 9721522
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 09:01:29.672192+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:24:26.923526
License: Public Domain

POCHÉ, Acting P. J.
I concur in the judgment of affirmance only.
The majority concludes that the Hitch1 issue is not reviewable on these appeals from judgments of conviction entered on guilty pleas because a certificate of probable cause was not obtained. In my view Penal Code section 1538.5, subdivision (m) 2 preserves the issue for appellate review.
As a general rule, section 1538.5 “can be properly employed only to shield a defendant from Fourth Amendment violations; it has no part in protecting against Fifth Amendment infringements . . . .” (People v. Superior Court (Zolnay) (1975) 15 Cal.3d 729, 734 [125 Cal.Rptr. 798, 542 P.2d 1390]; see also People v. DeVaughn (1977) 18 Cal.3d 889, 896, fn. 6 [135 Cal.Rptr. 786, 558 P.2d 872].) But that rule does not apply where the defendant seeks to suppress tangible evidence obtained as a result of an unlawfully obtained admission or confession. (People v. Carter (1980) 108 Cal.App.3d 127, 130 [166 Cal.Rptr. 304]; People v. Superior Court (Mahle) (1970) 3 Cal.App.3d 476, 484 [83 Cal.Rptr. 771], cited with approval in People v. Superior Court (Zolnay), supra, 15 Cal.3d at pp. 733-734.) In other words, although section 1538.5 cannot be employed to challenge an admission or confession alleged to be the product of a Fifth Amendment violation (People v. Brown (1981) 119 Cal.App.3d 116, 124-125 [173 Cal.Rptr. 877]; People v. Cartwright (1979) 98 Cal.App.3d 369, 382-383), where the party challenges the tangible fruits of such a Fifth Amendment violation, section 1538.5 is the appropriate procedural vehicle. (People v. Pettingill (1978) 21 Cal.3d 231, 234-235 [145 Cal.Rptr. 861, 578 P.2d 108]; People v. Superior Court (Zolnay), supra, 15 Cal.3d at p. 735.)
*35Similarly where a defendant seeks to suppress the tangible fruits of a Hitch violation his motion should survive a guilty plea as it would if he had sought to suppress the tangible evidence of a Miranda3 violation.
It is true, of course, that Miranda involves a different clause of the Fifth Amendment (the privilege against self-incrimination) than Hitch (due process) but that does not explain the lead opinion’s holding that the former withstands a guilty plea and the latter does not. Such a result not only imposes novel consequences upon the law of criminal procedure but involves and is based upon distinctions which—if they exist at all—have not been apparent to any judicial eye before. The additional procedural complexity which this holding imposes upon the everyday practice of criminal law is in my view unwise, unnecessary, unexplained and unfair. Accordingly, I would proceed to reach the merits of defendants’ Hitch argument.
Assuming for purposes of argument only that Hitch error was established, the trial court was not compelled to impose the remedy of suppression of the evidence seized pursuant to the search warrant. This is so because the trial court is vested with “a large measure of discretion in determining the appropriate sanction” to be imposed for destruction of evidence in violation of the Hitch principles. (See, e.g., People v. Zamora (1980) 28 Cal.3d 88, 99 [167 Cal.Rptr. 573, 615 P.2d 1361].) Its job is to “tailor the sanction to compensate for the exact wrong done; ...” (Id., at p. 103.)
Here there is no demonstrated need to impose the sanction of suppression of conclusive evidence. (See People v. Hitch, supra, 12 Cal.3d at p. 653, fn. 7.) Instead, an appropriate sanction would have been in the range of either suppression of the officer’s testimony at trial (see People v. Mejia (1976) 57 Cal.App.3d 574 [129 Cal.Rptr. 192]) or an instruction to the jury relating the destruction of the surveillance notes to the officer’s testimony (see People v. Zamora, supra, 28 Cal.3d at pp. 99-103).
I concur in the judgment affirming the convictions because even if defendants had been successful in demonstrating Hitch error, they have not demonstrated that they would have been entitled to an order suppressing the evidence. That is the only issue which survives the guilty pleas.
A petition for a rehearing was denied June 28, 1984, and on July 11, 1984, the opinion was modified to read as printed above. Appellants’ petition for a hearing by the Supreme Court was denied September 19, 1984.

People v. Hitch (1974) 12 Cal.3d 641 [117 Cal.Rptr. 9, 527 P.2d 361],

A11 statutory references are to the Penal Code.

Miranda v. Arizona (1966) 384 U.S. 436 [16 L.Ed.2d 694, 86 S.Ct. 1602, 10 A.L.R.3d 974],