Court Opinion

ID: 9735523
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 18:20:45.069241+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:26:59.529441
License: Public Domain

ASHBURN, J.
Concurring. On the face of the matter it is difficult to conceive of the use or intended use of a dangerous weapon in the commission of an abortion or an escape from detection or arrest for same. It is not a crime of violence against another but is committed with the full consent of each participant and in secret. In other words, the use of a dangerous weapon ordinarily has no part in an abortion and *760section 12022, Penal Code, seems to have no application. But the facts of this case reveal that this is not universally true.
Defendant apparently was in the abortion business. He told Miss Rodda, the prospective abortee, that he did not want to do the job because “the heat was on him, and that he had been followed.” When she was insistent he said, “Well, let’s go for a ride.” This they did and defendant told her “That he had been tipped off someone was going to set him up in a deal and that he had been followed for two weeks. ’ ’ Prom time to time he looked in the rear mirror and changed direction, checking to see if he had been followed. After they arrived at Miss Rodda’s motel room where the abortion was to be performed and after some preliminaries which amounted to little more than preparation for the crime, defendant began filling a hypodermic syringe and Miss Rodda asked, “Do I get that right now?” That was the signal for officers who were in the adjoining room to enter; this they did and ordered defendant to put his hands against the wall. After doing so he engaged in a maneuver which seemed designed to and caused his revolver to fall to the floor. Upon being asked if he usually carried a gun when he went out, he replied that he had carried it the last couple of days, and when asked why he did so, he said that someone had been tailing him for about two weeks and he did not know who it was. Upon being asked whether he had any enemies, he said he might have and added that he had been followed by several Ford cars, including a green 1959 Ford, and by a blue Lincoln with a colored man in it. Defendant himself testified that he had heard a rumor that “he had been set up by the police” and was worried for the two weeks prior to October 4 because he did not know whether he was being followed by the police or by someone hired by Rosoto. During that time he kept the gun in his car, intending to use it “to shoot it out” with anyone who tried to “pull” him “over to the side of the road.” This was enough to afford basis for a reasonable inference that defendant was intending to shoot his way out of any abortion entanglement—to ward off intruders or to effect an escape if necessary.
In the light of this testimony certain of the language of In re Rodgers, 121 Cal.App. 370, 371 [9 P.2d 223], becomes pertinent: “After providing that certain classes of persons should refrain from the carrying of concealed weapons, the legislature having in mind that anyone committing a felony, such for instance, as burglary or robbery, going armed, *761would do so with the intent of killing anyone who should interrupt or attempt to interrupt the commission of such offense, or who, after committing a felony, to which a severe penalty is attached, would, if armed, resist arrest, even to the extent of taking life, provided additional penalties which should be added to the penalties otherwise specified in the codes as penalties for the offenses for which such person is arrested, prosecuted and convicted.”
For these reasons I concur in the ruling of the majority.