People v. Rodas

IN THE SUPREME COURT OF CALIFORNIA

THE PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. DOMINGO RODAS, Defendant and Appellant.

S237379

Second Appellate District, Division Three B255598

Los Angeles County Superior Court BA360125

November 26, 2018

Justice Kruger filed the opinion of the court, in which Chief Justice Cantil-Sakauye and Justices Chin, Corrigan, Liu, Cuéllar, and Kline concurred.

PEOPLE v. RODAS S237379

Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J.

Defendant Domingo Rodas was found incompetent to stand trial and ordered confined at a state hospital. After several months of treatment with antipsychotic medication, hospital physicians reported that defendant had regained trial competence, but cautioned that it was important for defendant to continue taking his medication. At the start of his jury trial some months later, however, the trial court learned that defendant had stopped taking his medication and that he had begun communicating incoherently with counsel about defense strategy, exhibiting some of the same symptoms he had displayed during earlier episodes of incompetence. Defense counsel declared a doubt about defendant’s competence, but the trial court ruled that the trial could proceed after conducting a brief colloquy with defendant in which defendant was able to identify the charges against him and stated a willingness to go to trial and work with counsel. Later, against counsel’s advice, defendant testified in his own defense. The testimony was incoherent and the court struck it as irrelevant. Defendant was ultimately convicted on several counts and sentenced to multiple life terms. We conclude the trial court erred in failing to suspend the criminal trial and initiate competency proceedings at the time counsel declared a doubt as to her client’s competence. As a general rule, once a defendant has been found competent to stand trial, a trial court may rely on that finding absent a

PEOPLE v. RODAS Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J.

substantial change of circumstances. But when a formerly incompetent defendant has been restored to competence solely or primarily through administration of medication, evidence that the defendant is no longer taking his medication and is again exhibiting signs of incompetence will generally establish such a change in circumstances and will call for additional, formal investigation before trial may proceed. In the face of such evidence, a trial court’s failure to suspend proceedings violates the constitutional guarantee of due process in criminal trials. (People v. Rogers (2006) 39 Cal.4th 826, 847.) I. Rodas, also known by his birth name, Doudley Brown, was charged with murdering Frederick Lombardo, Keith Fallin and Roger Cota, and attempting to murder Kenneth McFetridge and Ronald Vaughn. The victims were homeless men living on the street in Los Angeles. All of the victims were stabbed over the course of July and August 2009; four of the stabbings occurred within a few hours in the same area of Hollywood. Defendant was apprehended in the area carrying a knife. DNA from three of the victims was found on the knife, its sheath, or defendant’s shirt. A surviving victim later identified defendant from a photographic lineup, and one of the fatal stabbings was captured by surveillance cameras. In February 2012, before trial began, the parties raised the question of whether defendant was competent to stand trial. The parties agreed to submit the question on the reports of two experts, psychiatrist Kory J. Knapke and psychologist Sara Arroyo, without any live testimony or argument. After reviewing the reports, the trial court found defendant incompetent to stand trial.