People v. Stanphill

California Court of Appeal Dec 23, 1958 No. Crim. 3328Published

Before: Wood (Fred B.)

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Holding. The court held that the trial court erred in adjudicating the defendant a habitual criminal based on unauthenticated documents presented at sentencing without providing the defendant an opportunity to challenge them. The judgment regarding the habitual criminal status was reversed and remanded for a limited retrial on that issue.

Issues

Whether the defendant's Oklahoma conviction qualifies as a predicate offense for habitual criminal status under California law.
Whether the documents used to prove the prior conviction were properly authenticated.
Whether the defendant was denied due process by the trial court's reliance on unauthenticated evidence at sentencing without an opportunity to challenge it.

Disposition. reversed and remanded

Quotations verified verbatim against the opinion

“The part of the judgment adjudging defendant a habitual criminal and imposing sentence is reversed and the cause is remanded with directions to resentence defendant after the conclusion of the limited new trial”

“There is no indication in the record that defendant was at any time given an opportunity to question the correctness or legal competence of the authentication of the documents mentioned. Such an opportunity should have been afforded him.”

[469]

WOOD (Fred B.), J.

Convicted of first degree robbery, committed while armed with a deadly weapon, and of conspiracy to commit robbery, with three prior convictions (one in Oklahoma in 1947 and two in California in 1951)

, defendant was found by the trial court to be “a habitual criminal.” Defendant questions this finding.

In respect to the Oklahoma conviction, the indictment charged that this defendant was convicted of the “crime of burglary, second degree . . . , a felony,” that judgment thereon was rendered “on or about the 4th day of September, 1947,” and that he “served a term of imprisonment therefor in the State Prison.” Defendant admitted “as true the prior conviction of Felony of the date of September 4, 1947, as charged. ...”

However, it does not appear from the charge itself, nor from defendant’s admission thereof, whether he was convicted of a crime which is specified by section 644 of the Penal Code as one which is used as a basis for determining that a person is “a habitual criminal.” The Oklahoma statute includes in its definition of second degree burglary the doing of certain acts which would not constitute such an offense in California under our statutes.

For example, Oklahoma defines second degree burglary as breaking and entering “any . . . automobile, truck, trailer . . .” (21 Okl.St.Ann. § 1435.) These are broader terms than those appearing in section 459 of our Penal Code, which uses the expression “vehicle as defined by” our Vehicle Code if “the doors of such vehicle are locked.”

There is the possibility, also, that defendant may have been convicted under an earlier Oklahoma statute for an offense which would not qualify as burglary under our statute. Until their repeal in 1941, sections 1433 and 1434 of title 21 of the Oklahoma statutes defined certain entries as second degree burglary if made “with intent to commit any crime,” not limited to “intent to commit grand or petit larceny or any felony” as in our section 459. (See 21 Okl.St.Ann. (1937) §§ 1433-1434, repealed by Laws, 1941, p. 87, § 2.)

The repeal of sections 1433-1434 did not preclude subsequent prosecution for a violation thereof. The Oklahoma eonstitu

People v. Stanphill

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