People v. Davalos

192 Cal.App.3d 10 (1987) 238 Cal. Rptr. 50 THE PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Respondent,

v.

MARTIN ROBERT DAVALOS, Defendant and Appellant.

Docket No. 23984. Court of Appeals of California, Appellate Department, Superior Court, Los Angeles.

April 15, 1987. [12] COUNSEL

Nathan Misraje for Defendant and Appellant.

James K. Hahn, City Attorney, William N. Sterling and Frank M. Horowitz, Deputy City Attorneys, for Plaintiff and Respondent.

OPINION

SOVEN, J.

Defendant was arrested while driving under the influence of PCP. He was convicted by a jury of several offenses, including violations of Vehicle Code section 23152, subdivision (a) ("driving while under the influence") and Health and Safety Code section 11550, subdivision (b) ("using or being under the influence of a controlled substance.") The trial court imposed a separate sentence for each of the above offenses. We affirm.

DISCUSSION

(1a) Defendant contends that the trial court violated Penal Code section 654 in imposing sentence both for violating section 23152, subdivision (a) and section 11550, subdivision (b).[1] We do not agree. We conclude that each charge was a separate punishable offense and did not constitute a single course of conduct for which multiple punishment was improper.

Penal Code section 654 states in pertinent part: "An act ... which is made punishable in different ways by different provisions ... may be punishable under either of such provisions, but in no case can it be punished under more than one..."

(2) The prohibition against multiple punishment is designed to insure that a defendant's punishment will be commensurate with his criminal liability (Neal v. State of California (1960) 55 Cal.2d 11, 20 [9 Cal. Rptr. 607, 357 P.2d 839]); the prohibition does not apply where each offense is divisible, none facilitates the commission of the other or is committed as a means of committing the other, and none is incidental to the commission of the other. (People v. Smith (1984) 155 Cal. App.3d 539, 544-545 [202 Cal. Rptr. 259].)