People v. Wells

Opinion

CHRISTIAN, J. Warren Wells and Charles Bursey, with several co-defendants, were indicted by the Grand Jury of Alameda County in April 1968 on two counts of attempted murder (Pen. Code, § 187) and two counts of assault with a deadly weapon upon a police officer (Pen. Code, § 245, subd. (b)). A jury, found Bursey guilty of all four counts. In a separate trial Wells was found guilty of the two assault counts and acquitted of the counts of attempted murder. Appeals from the ensuing judgments resulted in a determination that the trial court had erred in refusing to make the judges available for examination in hearing appellants’ motions to quash the indictment. We held that where the judges chose not to require the jury commissioner to prepare a grand jury list (see Pen. Code, § 903.3) and instead constituted themselves collectively as the body compiling the list, they must be made available for examination to test the constitutionality of the selection procedures. Both judgments were reversed with directions to the trial court “to take evidence on the motion to quash the indictment before, reconsidering the ruling on the motion.” (In re Wells (1971) 20 Cal.App.3d 640, 651 [98 Cal.Rptr. 1].)1

After taking evidence in a consolidated hearing of the motions of both appellants, the trial court denied the motions to quash the indictment and pronounced judgment committing both appellants to state prison with credit for time theretofore served.

In the former appeal it was determined that the procedures authorized by the California statutes for the selection of grand jurors are not inherently unconstitutional (see In re Wells, supra, 20 Cal.App.3d at p. 649). The present appeal turns upon a single issue: whether the order denying the motion to quash the indictment is supported by substantial evidence.

Jury selection officials cannot stop with their personal acquaintances; they must acquaint themselves with the qualifications of potential jurors from all identifiable groups within the community. (Cassell v. Texas [14](1950) 339 U.S. 282, 289 [94 L.Ed.2d 839, 848, 70 S.Ct. 629]; Hill v. Texas (1942) 316 U.S. 400, 404 [86 L.Ed. 1559, 1562, 62 S.Ct. 1159]; Brooks v. Beto (5th Cir. 1966) 366 F.2d 1, 12 [4 A.L.R. Fed. 403]; In re Wells, supra, 20 Cal.App.3d 640, 650.) Each selector must refrain from any course of conduct which has the natural consequence of excluding a group of citizens from jury service. (Avery v. Georgia (1953) 345 U.S. 559, 561 [97 L.Ed. 1244, 1247, 735 S.Ct. 891].)