California Court of Appeal May 22, 2025 No. E083478Unpublished
Filed 5/22/25 P. v. Williams CA4/2 NOT TO BE PUBLISHED IN OFFICIAL REPORTS California Rules of Court, rule 8.1115(a), prohibits courts and parties from citing or relying on opinions not certified for publication or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 This opinion has not been certified for publication or ordered published for purposes of rule 8.1115.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
FOURTH APPELLATE DISTRICT
DIVISION TWO
THE PEOPLE,
Plaintiff and Respondent, E083478
v. (Super. Ct. No. FSB20003094)
BILLY WILLIAMS, JR., OPINION
Defendant and Appellant.
APPEAL from the Superior Court of San Bernardino County. J. David Mazurek,
Judge. Affirmed.
Thomas Owen, under appointment by the Court of Appeal, for Defendant and
Appellant.
Rob Bonta, Attorney General, Lance E. Winters, Chief Assistant Attorney General,
Charles C. Ragland, Assistant Attorney General, Christine Y. Friedman, and Eric A.
Swenson, Deputy Attorneys General, for Plaintiff and Respondent.
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I.
INTRODUCTION
Defendant and appellant Billy Williams, Jr., contends the trial court erroneously 1 denied his Romero motion to dismiss a prior “strike” offense. We disagree and affirm.
II. 2 FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND 3 Defendant was charged with two counts of murder (Pen. Code, § 187, subd. (a).
He pled guilty to voluntary manslaughter for one count and a jury found him guilty of the
other count. In a bifurcated proceeding, the trial court found that defendant had suffered
a strike offense for a felony conviction for first degree robbery (§§ 211, 667, subds. (b)-
(i), 1170.12, subds. (a)-(d)).
Before sentencing, defendant filed a Romero motion to strike his prior strike
conviction. Defendant argued the court should strike his prior strike conviction because
he committed the offense about 26 years prior when he was 18 years old. The trial court
denied the motion and sentenced defendant to a 11 years for the voluntary manslaughter
conviction and a consecutive term of 15 years to life, doubled to 30 years to life because
of his prior strike offense.
1 People v. Superior Court (Romero) (1996) 13 Cal.4th 497. 2 Given the limited scope of defendant’s appeal and our resolution of the single issue on appeal, we provide only a brief recitation of this case’s background. 3 All further statutory references are to the Penal Code.
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III.
DISCUSSION
The sole issue on appeal is whether the trial court properly denied defendant’s
Romero motion. We conclude that it did.
“As the Supreme Court explained in Romero, section 1385 permits a trial court to
strike an allegation of a prior felony conviction in cases brought under the ‘“Three
Strikes’” law, in the interests of justice.” (People v. Thimmes (2006) 138 Cal.App.4th
1207, 1213, citing Romero, supra, 13 Cal.4th at pp. 529-530.) “[I]n ruling whether to
strike or vacate a prior serious and/or violent felony conviction allegation . . . the court in
question must consider whether, in light of the nature and circumstances of his present
felonies and prior serious and/or violent felony convictions, and the particulars of his
background, character, and prospects, the defendant may be deemed outside the scheme’s
spirit, in whole or in part, and hence should be treated as though he had not previously
been convicted of one or more serious and/or violent felonies.” (People v. Williams
(1998) 17 Cal.4th 148, 161.)
The purpose of the Three Strikes law is “to ensure longer prison sentences and
greater punishment for those who commit a felony and have been previously convicted of
one or more serious or violent felony offenses.” (§ 667, subd. (b).) The Three Strikes
law “establishes a sentencing requirement to be applied in every case where the
defendant has at least one qualifying strike,” unless the trial court determines the
defendant falls outside the scheme’s spirit. (People v. Strong (2001) 87 Cal.App.4th 328,
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337-338.) “[E]xtraordinary must the circumstance be by which a career criminal can be
deemed to fall outside the spirit of the very scheme within which he squarely falls once
he commits a strike as part of a long and continuous criminal record, the continuation of
which the law was meant to attack.” (Id. at p. 338.) Thus, the Three Strikes law “not
only establishes a sentencing norm, it carefully circumscribes the trial court’s power to
depart from this norm.” (People v. Carmony (2004) 33 Cal.4th 367, 378.)
“The trial court is not required to state reasons for declining to exercise its
discretion under section 1385.” (People v. Gillispie (1997) 60 Cal.App.4th 429, 433.)
The trial court “is presumed to have considered all of the relevant factors in the absence
of an affirmative record to the contrary.” (People v. Myers (1999) 69 Cal.App.4th 305,
310.)
A trial court’s decision not to strike a prior conviction allegation is reviewed under
the abuse of discretion standard. (People v. Carmony, supra, 33 Cal.4th at p. 371.) “This
standard is deferential . . . it asks in substance whether the ruling in question ‘falls outside
the bounds of reason’ under the applicable law and the relevant facts.” (People v.
Williams, supra, 17 Cal.4th at p. 162.) “Under that standard an appellant who seeks
reversal must demonstrate that the trial court’s decision was irrational or arbitrary. It is
not enough to show that reasonable people might disagree about whether to strike one or
more of his prior convictions. Where the record demonstrates that the trial court balanced
the relevant facts and reached an impartial decision in conformity with the spirit of the
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law, we shall affirm the trial court’s ruling, even if we might have ruled differently in the
first instance.” (People v. Myers, supra, 69 Cal.App.4th at pp. 309-310.)
The record amply supports the trial court’s decision to deny defendant’s Romero
motion. Although defendant committed his prior strike offense long ago when he was 18
years old, he did not live a crime-free life in between that offense and his current
offenses. During that 26-year period, he was convicted of 10 different convictions, three
parole violations, and one violation of post-release community supervision. His offenses
included petty theft in 1995, unlawful sexual intercourse with a minor in 1999,
unlawfully taking a vehicle and spousal battery in 2000, possession of cocaine base in
2002 and 2009, possession of a controlled substance in 2010 and 2014, and attempting to
possess a controlled substance for sale in 2019. And during this 26-year period,
defendant was incarcerated nearly the entire time.
Defendant’s recidivism shows that he is “‘the kind of revolving-door career
criminal for whom the Three Strikes law was devised.’” (People v. Pearson (2008) 165
Cal.App.4th 740, 749.) Given defendant’s extensive criminal history involving violent
and non-violent offenses, his decades-long drug use, recidivism, and repeated violations
of parole, the trial court’s finding that defendant did not fall “outside the Three Strikes
scheme” was not arbitrary or irrational. “The record reflects [defendant] has been
committing crimes [his entire life], and his criminality has not been deterred by prior
periods of incarceration or release on community supervision.” (People v. Nunez (2023)
97 Cal.App.5th 362, 372.) The trial court thus properly found that this was not an
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“extraordinary” case that justified granting defendant’s Romero motion. As a result, the
trial court did not abuse its discretion by denying the motion.
IV.
DISPOSITION
The judgment is affirmed.
NOT TO BE PUBLISHED IN OFFICIAL REPORTS
CODRINGTON J.
We concur:
McKINSTER Acting P. J.
RAPHAEL J.
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AI Brief
AI-generated · verify before citing
Holding. The court held that the trial court did not abuse its discretion in denying the defendant's Romero motion to strike a prior felony conviction, as the defendant's extensive criminal history and recidivism placed him squarely within the spirit of the Three Strikes law.
Issues
Did the trial court abuse its discretion by denying the defendant's Romero motion to strike a prior strike conviction?
Disposition. Affirmed
Quotations verified verbatim against the opinion
“The record amply supports the trial court’s decision to deny defendant’s Romero motion.”