People v. Griffin

WILSON, J.

Defendants pleaded guilty to a charge of false imprisonment. Each was permitted to file an application for probation. Garcia’s application was denied and he was sentenced to prison and committed to the Youth Authority. Two other counts of the information charging kidnap

[547]

ing and assault with intent to commit rape were dismissed as to him.

Griffin and Nostrand moved to withdraw their respective pleas of guilty, which motions were denied. Their applications for probation were denied and each was sentenced to prison and referred to the Youth Authority. The other two counts as to these defendants were ordered off calendar. The three defendants have joined in a notice of appeal from the respective judgments of conviction and in a purported appeal from the order denying their motion to set aside their pleas of guilty and from “any orders made after judgment.” Defendant Garcia did not make a motion to withdraw his plea of guilty and the purported appeal from the denial of the motions is therefore not applicable to him. The orders denying the motions of Griffin and Nostrand for change of plea were made before judgment and are not appealable. (Pen. Code, § 1237;

People

v.

Block,

134 Cal.App. 217, 218 [25 P.2d 242].) Defendants have not referred to any order made after judgment to which they have taken exception.

When the case was called for trial each defendant was represented by counsel and each requested to withdraw his plea of not guilty as to the charge of false imprisonment and to enter a plea of guilty. The deputy district attorney asked each defendant separately if he desired to enter a plea of guilty, whether he pleaded guilty freely and voluntarily and without any promises of immunity or threats, and if he was pleading guilty because he was guilty. To each of these interrogatories each defendant individually answered in the affirmative.

Before judgment was pronounced, a new attorney for Nostrand and Griffin who had been substituted in the action moved to allow them to withdraw their pleas of guilty for the purpose of entering pleas of not guilty. At the hearing of this application defendants’ former attorney testified that they had always denied their guilt to him but he told them that in his judgment they had committed a technical false imprisonment and the best thing for them to do was enter a plea of guilty to that charge. Griffin testified that he had never detained the girl named in the information nor injured her. He admitted that at the time he pleaded guilty he did so freely and voluntarily and without any threats or promises, but he thought it was just a matter of form, did not take it