California Court of Appeal Jun 26, 2025 No. E084425Unpublished
Filed 6/26/25 P. v. Correa 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NOT TO BE PUBLISHED IN OFFICIAL REPORTS California Rules of Court, rule 8.1115(a), prohibits courts and parties from citing or relying on opinions not certified for publication or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 This opinion has not been certified for publication or ordered published for purposes of rule 8.1115.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, E084425
v. (Super.Ct.No. FVI23003813)
CHRISTINA GLORIA CORREA, OPINION
Defendant and Appellant.
APPEAL from the Superior Court of San Bernardino County. Daniel W.
Detienne, Judge. Affirmed.
Richard Jay Moller, 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, Donald W. Ostertag and Robin
Urbanski, Deputy Attorneys General, for Plaintiff and Respondent.
1
A jury convicted defendant and appellant Christina Gloria Correa of voluntary
manslaughter (Pen. Code, § 192, subd. (a)1) for the stabbing death of a family friend and
found true the personal use of a knife allegation (§ 12022, subd. (b)(1)). The trial court
sentenced her to prison for a total term of seven years, consisting of a six-year midterm
subdivision (b)(6)(A) and (C), establishes a presumption in cases in which the defendant
“has experienced psychological, physical, or childhood trauma, including, but not limited
to, abuse, neglect, exploitation, or sexual violence” or “was a victim of intimate partner
violence,” and that trauma was “a contributing factor in the commission of the offense,”
the court “shall” impose the lower term. (See People v. Salazar (2023) 15 Cal.5th 416,
419.) The court must impose the lower term unless it finds “the aggravating
circumstances outweigh the mitigating circumstances [such] that imposition of the lower
term would be contrary to the interests of justice.” (§ 1170, subd. (b)(6); see Salazar, at
pp. 419, 423.)
In imposing a sentence, the trial court “may not impose an upper term by using the
fact of any enhancement upon which sentence is imposed” (§ 1170, subd. (b)(5)), but
“[o]nly a single aggravating factor is required to impose the upper term . . . .” (People v.
Osband (1996) 13 Cal.4th 622, 728). The court’s sentence is ultimately reviewed under
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the abuse of discretion standard. (People v. Sandoval (2007) 41 Cal.4th 825, 847 [a trial
court’s discretion “must be exercised in a manner . . . that is consistent with the letter and
spirit of the law”].) “To prove an abuse of discretion, ‘“[t]he burden is on the party
attacking the sentence to clearly show that the sentencing decision was irrational or
arbitrary. [Citation.] In the absence of such a showing, the trial court is presumed to
have acted to achieve legitimate sentencing objectives, and its discretionary
determination to impose a particular sentence will not be set aside on review.”’
[Citation.] To meet this burden, the defendant must ‘affirmatively demonstrate that the
trial court misunderstood its sentencing discretion.’” (People v. Lee (2017) 16
Cal.App.5th 861, 866.)
3. Analysis.
a. Imposition of the middle term for voluntary manslaughter.
Defendant contends the trial court ignored her intimate partner violence and
childhood trauma and failed to apply the statutory presumptive low term. Alternatively,
she contends the record does not support the court’s finding that the aggravating factors
outweighed the mitigating ones to support imposition of the middle term. As we explain,
we reject her contentions.
Here, the trial court accepted section 1170, subdivision (b)(6)’s mandate to impose
the low term in cases of intimate partner violence and childhood trauma, but noted an
exception where “there’s a finding that the aggravating circumstances outweigh the
mitigating circumstance, such that the imposition of the low term would be contrary to
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the interest of justice.” According to the court, the facts in this case presented such
exception. (People v. Knowles (2024) 105 Cal.App.5th 757, 765 [recognizing the mere
fact a defendant has suffered past trauma is insufficient for a presumptive low term under
the statutory text; instead, the trauma must be a contributing factor in the commission of
the offense]; People v. Banner (2022) 77 Cal.App.5th 226, 241 [same].) We agree.
As the People point out, the only evidence of defendant’s prior trauma came from
the social worker’s report describing her reported childhood trauma and intimate partner
abuse. However, the record is void of any evidence the trauma substantially contributed
to her offense.3 Absent such evidence, the court could appropriately decline to give the
reported trauma substantial mitigating weight.4 Nonetheless, the court acknowledged
defendant’s prior trauma and the mitigating circumstances—the crime occurred under
unusual circumstances and defendant had virtually no prior record. After weighing the
3 According to defendant, the social worker’s report “clearly established a connection between [her] impulsive response to being sexually assaulted and her prior sexual assault history.” However, an impulsive act involves doing something “suddenly without any planning and without considering the effects they may have.” (<https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/impulsive> [as of June 23, 2025].) Here, defendant did not stab the victim in the bathroom. Rather, she left the bathroom (presumably after he was no longer holding her to the ground), went to the kitchen, looked for a specific knife, stabbed furniture on her path toward him, reached around her father, and then stabbed the victim when he was at the door that leads to the garage.
4 The trial court did not discuss the correlation between defendant’s childhood trauma and her offense. Rather, the court stated: “Mandatory low term under [section] 1170[, subdivision] (b)(6), there has to be childhood trauma. You have to be a youth or the victim of intimate partner violence or human trafficking. So we had some discussions about the intimate partner violence here. There’s another part of that which is the court, if one of those exist, has to give low term, unless there’s a finding that the aggravating circumstances outweigh the mitigating circumstances, such that the imposition of the low term would be contrary to the interest of justice.”
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competing factors, the court found the statutory presumptive low term inapplicable.
Nothing in the record shows this sentencing decision was irrational, arbitrary, or
amounted to an abuse of discretion.
Having rejected the presumptive low term, the trial court was tasked with deciding
whether to impose the low, middle, or upper term. Previously, the court found true the
aggravating factors that (1) the crime involved great violence and great bodily harm, and
(2) defendant was armed with or used a weapon. Defendant asserts the court erred in
finding the victim’s death involved great violence and great bodily harm because it
“relied solely on the mere fact that [he] was killed.” Citing People v. Black (2007)
41 Cal.4th 799, 877, she argues “[a]n ‘aggravating circumstance’ is a fact that makes the
‘offense distinctively worse than ordinary.’” She claims her voluntary manslaughter was
not distinctively worse than other voluntary manslaughters because (1) she tried to
minimize the amount of violence by throwing things at the victim while screaming at him
to leave, (2) she grabbed the knife and stabbed the furniture—akin to a warning shot—
before stabbing him “once” after he sexually assaulted her, and (3) she called 911 and
waited for the police to arrive. According to defendant, the court’s weighing process was
flawed because the aggravating factors it identified did not demonstrate the low term was
contrary to the interests of justice. We are not persuaded.
Here, the trial court acknowledged the mitigating factors, specifically mentioning
“no prior record, unusual circumstances, unlikely to reoccur, [and] great provocation,”
but concluded the aggravating factors—great violence and great bodily harm and armed
13
with or used a weapon—outweighed them. The court noted that “someone died.
Someone was stabbed to death and that person bled out in a parking lot of a drug store.”5
Defendant’s argument amounts to nothing more than a challenge to the court’s weighing
process. She invites us to decide that the mitigating factors outweighed the aggravating
factors found by the court. We decline her request. “‘[W]here the record demonstrates
that the trial court balanced the relevant facts and reached an impartial decision in
conformity with the spirit of the law, we shall affirm the trial court’s ruling, even if we
might have ruled differently in the first instance.’” (People v. Carmony (2004)
33 Cal.4th 367, 378.) Such is the case before us. In short, the finding that the
aggravating factors outweighed the mitigating factors is not so unreasonable a conclusion
that it amounts to an abuse of discretion.
b. Imposition of one-year use of weapon enhancement.
Defendant contends the trial court abused its discretion under section 1385 by
declining to dismiss the one-year enhancement for personally using a knife. Also, she
argues the court violated the rule prohibiting dual or overlapping use of a fact when it
relied on the personal use aggravating factor to impose the middle term, rather than the
low term.
5 Defendant argues the fact that the victim died after bleeding out in the parking lot from his stab wound does not make the offense distinctively worse than other voluntary manslaughters. However, she discounts the fact that she chose to use a deadly weapon upon an unarmed victim who was no longer a threat to her as evidenced by the fact that her father stood between the two, and the victim was at the door that leads to the garage.
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1. Dismissal of enhancement under section 1385.
Under section 1385, subdivision (c)(1), a “court shall dismiss an enhancement if it
is in the furtherance of justice to do so.” Under section 1385, subdivision (c)(2)(E), the
court must “consider and afford great weight to evidence offered by the defendant to
prove that . . . . [t]he current offense is connected to prior victimization or childhood
trauma.” (Italics added.) Defendant asserts “there is no evidence in the record that the
court gave great weight in favor of dismissing the enhancement in light of the strong
mitigating evidence, particularly the presence of two super mitigant[ factor]s, or that the
dismissal of the enhancement would result in physical injury or other serious danger to
others.” We disagree.
First, as we previously observed, section 1385 does not require the trial court to
dismiss an enhancement even if it finds a mitigating factor exists. Instead, the statute
directs the court to “afford great weight to evidence offered by the defendant to prove”
the mitigating circumstance is present. (§ 1385, subd. (c)(2).) The court complied with
that standard when it stated, “‘The court is to give great weight to the mitigating
circumstances unless it endangers public safety,’ and that’s defined as dismissal would
result in physical injury or serious danger to others. [¶] Looking at the case of [People v.
Gonzalez, supra], 103 Cal.App.5th at [page 215]. That’s a case where the court has to
look at the danger to public safety when [defendant] gets released. Not now, but when
she gets released. And in this case she was found guilty of voluntary manslaughter. So
as I said before, obviously the jury took into account what happened that night before the
15
stabbing, they also took into account that she walked up to someone, stabbed an unarmed
person in the chest, and that person died. So I think it would endanger public safety for
the court to dismiss that, and the court declines to dismiss the one-year enhancement.”
Next, the evidence in this case did not firmly satisfy the standard in section 1385,
subdivision (c)(2)(E). As described by defendant, the evidence before the trial court was
that she was sexually molested by her uncle when she was seven years old and raped by
her boyfriend when she was 23. While this evidence may be sufficient to demonstrate
she suffered intimate partner violence and childhood trauma, this fact alone does not
qualify as a mitigating circumstance under section 1385, subdivision (c)(2)(E), which
requires a finding that “[t]he current offense is connected to . . . childhood trauma.”
(Italics added.) The statute provides that the court may find such connection “if, after
reviewing any relevant and credible evidence, . . . the court concludes that the
defendant’s childhood trauma substantially contributed to the defendant’s involvement in
the commission of the offense.” (§ 1385, subd. (c)(6)(A).) Defendant fails to identify
any evidence in this record that demonstrates her childhood trauma “substantially
contributed” to her stabbing the victim when he was no longer a danger to her because he
had walked away, he was at the door that goes outside to the garage, and her father stood
between them. Some evidence of a connection between the childhood trauma and the
current crime was required here.
The trial court explicitly acknowledged defendant had suffered trauma—which
demonstrates the court did consider the trauma evidence—but concluded that dismissal of
16
the personal use enhancement would endanger public safety. (§ 1385, subd. (c).) That
conclusion reflects a determination her trauma was not connected to her crime.
2. Imposition of the middle term under section 1170, subdivision (b)(6) does not
implicate prohibition against dual use of aggravating sentencing factors.
When a statute specifies three possible terms, the trial court shall impose a
sentence not to exceed the middle term, unless there are circumstances in aggravation of
the crime that justify the imposition of a term of imprisonment exceeding the middle
term, and the facts underlying those circumstances have been stipulated to by the
defendant, or have been found true beyond a reasonable doubt at trial by the jury or by
the judge in a court trial. (§ 1170, subd. (b)(1), (2); Cal. Rules of Court, rule 4.420(a),
(b).) Although a single fact may be relevant to more than one sentencing choice, the dual
or overlapping use of an aggravating sentencing factor is prohibited in certain
circumstances. (People v. Scott (1994) 9 Cal.4th 331, 350; People v. Moberly (2009)
176 Cal.App.4th 1191, 1197.)
Here, the trial court selected the middle term for the voluntary manslaughter
conviction, citing defendant’s use of a weapon, and that the crime involved great violence
and great bodily harm. Defendant argues that “[w]hen the court declined to impose the
presumptive low term, the finding of both aggravating factors was not moot, particularly
because the court cannot use the weapon factor both to impose the weapon enhancement
and to decline to impose the presumptive low term.” In response, the People contend
“[n]othing in section 1170, subdivision (b)(b) prevents the trial court from using the same
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fact to determine that aggravating circumstances outweigh mitigating circumstances such
that the low term is contrary to the interests of justice and to also impose an
enhancement.”
Here, defendant failed to show she qualified for the presumptive low term under
section 1170, subdivision (b)(6)(A) and (C); thus, the standard middle term
[Under the amended statute, the low term is presumed only if the sentencing court first
finds the defendant falls into one of the three special categories set forth in § 1170,
subd. (b)(6) and, second, finds that circumstance was a contributing factor in the
commission of the offense.].) In sentencing defendant to the middle term, the trial court
was not required to apply any aggravating circumstances. (Hillburn, at pp. 204-205; see
People v. Bautista-Castanon (2023) 89 Cal.App.5th 922, 929 [holding § 1170,
subd. (b)(6), does not require aggravating circumstances to be proven to a jury beyond a
reasonable doubt and declining “to import [the subdivision (b)(1) and (2)] requirement
into section 1170, subdivision (b)(6) as a prerequisite to imposing the middle term”].)
Accordingly, the prohibition against dual use of aggravating sentencing factors was not
implicated.
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III. DISPOSITION
The judgment is affirmed.
NOT TO BE PUBLISHED IN OFFICIAL REPORTS
McKINSTER Acting P. J.
We concur:
MILLER J.
CODRINGTON J.
19
AI Brief
AI-generated · verify before citing
Holding. The trial court did not abuse its discretion in sentencing the defendant to the middle term for voluntary manslaughter and declining to dismiss the personal use of a weapon enhancement, as the court properly weighed aggravating and mitigating factors and found the defendant's trauma did not substantially contribute to the offense.
Issues
Did the trial court abuse its discretion by refusing to impose the presumptive low term under Penal Code section 1170, subdivision (b)(6)?
Did the trial court abuse its discretion by declining to dismiss the weapon enhancement under Penal Code section 1385?
Did the trial court err in its weighing of aggravating and mitigating factors during sentencing?
Disposition. Affirmed.
Quotations verified verbatim against the opinion
“The trial court rejected the presumptive low term sentence after finding the aggravating factors outweighed the mitigating ones.”
“The finding that the aggravating factors outweighed the mitigating factors is not so unreasonable a conclusion that it amounts to an abuse of discretion.”