People v. Holmes, McClain & Newborn (2022) · DecisionDepot

People v. Holmes, McClain & Newborn

Name: California Superior Court Tentative Rulings
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California Supreme Court Jan 31, 2022 No. S058734Published

IN THE SUPREME COURT OF CALIFORNIA

THE PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. KARL HOLMES, HERBERT McCLAIN and LORENZO NEWBORN, Defendants and Appellants.

S058734

Los Angeles County Superior Court BA092268

January 31, 2022

Justice Corrigan authored the opinion of the Court, in which Chief Justice Cantil-Sakauye and Justices Groban, Jenkins, and O’Rourke* concurred.

Justice Kruger filed a concurring opinion.

Justice Liu filed a dissenting opinion.

* Associate Justice of the Court of Appeal, Fourth Appellate District, Division One, assigned by the Chief Justice pursuant to article VI, section 6 of the California Constitution.

PEOPLE v. HOLMES, McCLAIN and NEWBORN S058734

Opinion of the Court by Corrigan, J.

On Halloween night in 1993, a group of young teenagers walking home from a party were mistaken for gang members and became the target of gunfire. Three were killed. Defendants Karl Holmes, Herbert McClain, and Lorenzo Newborn1 were each convicted of three counts of murder, five counts of attempted murder, and one count of conspiracy to commit murder.2 Special circumstances for lying in wait and multiple murder were found true as to each murder count.3 The jury found that Holmes was armed with a firearm in committing the offenses4 but found firearm allegations not true as to the other defendants. McClain was convicted of an additional attempted murder, with personal use of a firearm, based on an earlier incident.5 After the jury failed to reach a penalty verdict, that phase

1 Two codefendants originally included in the charges, Aurelius Bailey and Solomon Bowen, were tried separately and are not parties to this appeal. 2 Penal Code sections 187, subdivision (a), 664, and 182, subdivision (a). Further undesignated statutory references are to the Penal Code. 3 Section 190.2, subdivision (a)(3) and (15). 4 Section 12022, subdivision (a)(1). 5 Sections 187, subdivision (a), 664, and 12022.5, subdivision (a).

PEOPLE v. HOLMES, McCLAIN and NEWBORN Opinion of the Court by Corrigan, J.

was retried, and death verdicts were returned against all defendants. In addition, the court imposed life sentences on all attempted murder counts, 25-year-to-life sentences on the conspiracy counts, and five-year sentences on the firearm enhancements. 6 We affirm the judgment in its entirety. I. BACKGROUND A. Guilt Phase 1. October 28 Attempted Murder of Robert Price (McClain Only) McClain was a member of the Bloods gang, P-9. Robert Price was a member of the rival gang, Raymond Avenue Crips. On October 28, 1993, McClain encountered Price, as he left the Community Arms apartment complex. The men had seen each other before but never spoken. McClain asked Price for a cigarette. When Price gave him one, McClain responded, “Thank you, Blood,” then shot Price in the face with a .380-caliber handgun. As Price tried to flee, McClain fired several shots, hitting Price twice in the back. Price survived and was interviewed at the hospital where he refused to identify his assailant. He later identified McClain from a six-person photo lineup and again during both grand jury and trial testimony. Although warned by McClain not to testify, Price did so in exchange for a promise to relocate his family.

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Americans who comprised 26 percent of jurors called into the box was “not significant enough, in itself, to suggest discrimination”].) We have recognized several other factors as “ ‘especially relevant’ ” to determining “whether the record supports an inference the prosecution excused one or more of the African- American prospective jurors because of their race.” (Rhoades, supra, 8 Cal.5th at p. 429.) Among these is “ ‘whether the defendant is a member of [the identified] group.’ ” (Ibid.) The court says this “ ‘especially relevant’ ” factor is not implicated in this case because all three defendants are Black men and the defense’s Batson challenge concerned the prosecutor’s strikes of Black women. (Maj. opn., ante, at p. 43, fn. 18.) But it blinks reality to ignore the “ ‘ “concurrence of racial and sexual identity” ’ ” (People v. Motton (1985) 39 Cal.3d 596, 606 (Motton)) and the improper stereotypes that might cause a prosecutor to remove Black female jurors in a case involving Black male defendants. (See, e.g., People v. Triplett (2020) 48 Cal.App.5th 655, 683 (dis. stmt. of Liu, J.) [prosecutor struck a Black woman who, when asked if she knew anyone who had been treated badly by the police, said, “ ‘A Black woman in L.A. with young Black brothers, I have been harassed many times’ ” by police, but then “repeatedly and unequivocally” indicated that “she could be a fair juror and impartially consider police testimony”].) Indeed, “[r]acial identity between the defendant and the excused person might in some cases be the explanation for the prosecution’s adoption of [a] forbidden stereotype.” (Powers v. Ohio (1991) 499 U.S. 400, 416 (Powers).) Because “race prejudice stems from various causes and may manifest itself in different forms” (ibid.), the race of a defendant does not become irrelevant because an excused juror of the same race belongs to a different gender. As relevant here, “[t]he most commonly held

of his case. It is reasonable to assume that much of a defendant’s focus and attention when wearing one of these devices is occupied by anxiety over the possible triggering of the belt. A defendant is likely to concentrate on doing everything he can to prevent the belt from being activated, and is thus less likely to participate fully in his defense at trial.” (Durham, at p. 1306; id. at p. 1309 [vacating conviction where stun belt impaired defendant’s ability to “participate meaningfully” in his trial].) Just as “restraints can impair a defendant’s ability to testify effectively” (Jackson, supra, 58 Cal.4th at p. 741), a defendant representing himself would experience the same “ ‘likelihood that the stun belt had at least some [prejudicial] effect on [his] demeanor’ ” (id. at p. 740). Here, we need not speculate as to whether the belt adversely affected McClain’s demeanor or his ability to participate in his own case. McClain said during closing argument that if he “didn’t have this belt on,” he “would be able to express [himself] a lot more boisterous[ly].” (Cf. People v. Bryant, Smith and Wheeler (2014) 60 Cal.4th 335, 472 (conc. opn. of Liu, J.).) Moreover, the likelihood of prejudice arises not only from the “psychological effect of the device” (Mar, supra, 28 Cal.4th at p. 1225, fn. 7), but also from the “ ‘inherent[] prejudic[e]’ ” associated with the jury’s discovery in this case that defendants were under the imposition of restraints (Deck v. Missouri (2005) 544 U.S. 622, 635). “[E]ven where the State does not specifically argue the point,” the use of restraints “almost inevitably implies to a jury, as a matter of common sense, that court authorities consider the offender a danger to the community — . . . nearly always a relevant factor in jury decisionmaking.” (Id. at p. 633.) Here, the trial court disclosed the use of the belts to the jury and, even worse, said the devices were placed on defendants

People v. Holmes, McClain & Newborn

IN THE SUPREME COURT OF CALIFORNIA

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KRUGER, J.

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