Court Opinion

ID: 9956622
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2024-04-02 17:03:18.803289+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T08:17:41.890093
License: Public Domain

Filed 4/2/24 P. v. Snell CA3
                                           NOT TO BE PUBLISHED
California Rules of Court, rule 8.1115(a), prohibits courts and parties from citing or relying on opinions not certified for
publication or ordered published, except as specified by rule 8.1115(b). This opinion has not been certified for publication
or ordered published for purposes of rule 8.1115.

               IN THE COURT OF APPEAL OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA
                                       THIRD APPELLATE DISTRICT
                                                         (Butte)
                                                            ----

THE PEOPLE,                                                                                   C098382

                   Plaintiff and Respondent,                                    (Super. Ct. No. 20CF06233)

         v.

FLOYD LEE SNELL, JR.,

                   Defendant and Appellant.

Defendant Floyd Lee Snell, Jr., appeals a judgment entered after the trial court
resentenced him on March 23, 2023. Defendant’s sole contention on appeal is that he is
entitled to an additional 121 days of custody credit as a result of the reduction of his
sentence in a Stanislaus County case, thus allowing the reallocation of custody credits to
this one. We note defendant’s appellate counsel sought correction of this asserted error in
the trial court in accordance with Penal Code section 1237.1 (statutory section citations
that follow are to the Penal Code unless otherwise stated), thus allowing him to bring this
issue on appeal. However, having considered his arguments, we affirm the judgment.

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                     FACTS AND HISTORY OF THE PROCEEDINGS
       We limit this description to the information necessary to the disposition of
defendant’s argument on appeal. On December 9, 2020, defendant was arrested in Butte
County, resulting in the filing of a felony complaint in Butte County case No. 20CF06233
(the Butte County Case). Defendant was released on his own recognizance in the Butte
County Case on December 14, 2020.
       Sometime in 2021, defendant possessed a controlled substance. On May 10, 2021,
he pleaded guilty to possession of a controlled substance (Health & Saf. Code, § 11378)
and received a 16-month state prison sentence in Stanislaus County Superior Court case
No. CR21-003836 (the Stanislaus County Case) with credit for 11 actual days plus 10
conduct days for a total of 21 days’ custody credit. On May 27, 2021, defendant was
transferred to the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) to
begin serving his sentence. He was returned to the Butte County Jail on August 3, 2021.
       On November 18, 2021, defendant resolved the Butte County Case by pleading no
contest to carrying a dirk or dagger (§ 21310), and in exchange, the remaining counts
were dismissed and the prior strike allegation stricken. The case was set for sentencing
on December 16, 2021. The record does not reflect why sentencing did not proceed on
that day.
       Unbeknownst to the parties, but later determined by CDCR, defendant completed
his prison term in the Stanislaus County Case on December 29, 2021.
       Thereafter, on February 3, 2022, the trial court sentenced defendant in the Butte
County Case to an upper term of three years plus a consecutive term of eight months for
the Stanislaus County Case. Neither the court, nor the parties acknowledged that
defendant had already completed his time on the Stanislaus County Case. Defendant
appealed, and this court reversed for resentencing in compliance with the amendments
made by Senate Bill No. 567 (2021-2022 Reg. Sess.). (People v. Snell (Dec. 28, 2022,

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C095676) [nonpub. opn.].) We further acknowledged that defendant could address his
concerns regarding the allocation of his custody credits on remand. (Ibid.)
       On January 31, 2023, the CDCR sent a letter alerting the trial court that there
might be an error in defendant’s abstract of judgment from the 2022 sentencing. This
letter identified the error as the eight-month consecutive sentence in the Stanislaus
County Case because the Stanislaus County Case “was already served and since
discharged effective December 29, 2021. Therefore [the Butte County Case] should be
sentenced to the full term without any sentence relationship to [the Stanislaus County
Case].” The letter further advised that having been told by CDCR of an illegal sentence,
the trial court was entitled to reconsider all its sentencing choices.
       At defendant’s resentencing on March 23, 2023, the parties agreed with the
CDCR’s analysis concerning the Stanislaus County Case, and the trial court resentenced
defendant to a three-year upper term for the Butte County Case with credit for 455 actual
days plus 454 conduct days for a total of 909 days’ custody credit. Defendant timely
appealed.
       On August 29, 2023, defendant’s appellate counsel filed a letter in the trial court
asking that court to correct the allocation of defendant’s custody credits. Specifically,
counsel asserted defendant was entitled to an additional 121 days’ custody credit as a
result of the reduction in defendant’s sentence in the Stanislaus County Case from 16
months to eight months. The trial court denied this request on November 2, 2023, finding
defendant had already completed the Stanislaus County Case prison term prior to the
sentencing in the Butte County Case. Nonetheless, defendant was entitled to an
additional six days’ credit, bringing the court’s award to 461 actual days plus 460 conduct
days for a total of 921 days’ custody credit.

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                                        DISCUSSION
       Defendant argues, and the People agree, that he is entitled to any extra credits
earned in the Stanislaus County Case from August 3, 2021, forward when he was in
custody on both the Stanislaus County Case and the Butte County Case. This agreement,
however, does not mean defendant is entitled to the relief he seeks.
       This court agrees in principle that defendant is entitled to any extra credits that
may have been erroneously credited in excess of those required to satisfy the sentence in
the Stanislaus County Case where that custody was also attributable to the Butte County
Case. (People v. Snell, supra, C095676; see e.g., People v. Marquez (2003) 30 Cal.4th
14, 22-23 [because the earlier action had been dismissed, the strict causation rule did not
prohibit the awarding of credit for the period where the latter case had placed a custody
hold on the defendant then in custody in the earlier action]; People v. Phoenix (2014)
231 Cal.App.4th 1119, 1128-1129 [custody attributable to both cases such that once
resentenced in one matter, excess credit could be applied to the other]; People v.
Shropshire (2021) 70 Cal.App.5th 938, 948-949 [same].) However, we disagree with
defendant’s suggestion that he is entitled to have the custody credits reallocated as a
result of the reduction of his sentence in the Stanislaus County Case from 16 months to
eight months, which occurred in February 2022. Defendant has not shown that he is
entitled to that reduction.
       On the contrary, it is undisputed that the original 16-month prison term associated
with the Stanislaus County Case was completed and discharged on December 29, 2021.
Defendant has provided no authority showing the trial court had jurisdiction to alter that
completed sentence when it “resentenced” him to an eight-month consecutive term in that
case on February 3, 2022. Nor has he explained why he should receive that reduction in
light of: (1) this court’s reversal of the February 3, 2022, judgment for resentencing

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(People v. Snell, supra, C095676) and (2) his trial counsel’s March 23, 2023, agreement
that resentencing in the Stanislaus County Case was not required.
       Moreover, defendant has not shown an error in the calculation of custody credits
for the time he spent in custody after the Stanislaus County Case’s sentence was
discharged in December 2021, and we decline to find any latent ambiguity in whether
defendant received the credit he was due. The trial court was aware of all relevant
circumstances when it reallocated defendant’s custody credits in the Butte County Case
on November 2, 2023. While misallocation of custody credits results in an unauthorized
sentence that is correctable when presented (People v. Guillen (1994) 25 Cal.App.4th
756, 764), defendant still has the duty to overcome the presumption of correctness and
affirmatively demonstrate prejudicial error. (People v. Davis (2023) 87 Cal.App.5th 771,
779.) He has failed to do so here.

                                       DISPOSITION
       The judgment is affirmed.

                                                  HULL, J.

We concur:

EARL, P. J.

WISEMAN, J.

 Retired Associate Justice of the Court of Appeal, Fifth Appellate District, assigned by
the Chief Justice pursuant to article VI, section 6 of the California Constitution.

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