People v. Martin CA1/2 (2023) · DecisionDepot

People v. Martin CA1/2

Name: California Superior Court Tentative Rulings
Creator: DecisionDepot
License: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/

California Court of Appeal Jun 26, 2023 No. A163959Unpublished

Filed 6/26/23 P. v. Martin CA1/2 NOT TO BE PUBLISHED IN OFFICIAL REPORTS California Rules of Court, rule 8.1115(a), prohibits courts and parties from citing or relying on opinions not certified for publication or ordered published, except as specified by rule 8.1115(b). This opinion has not been certified for publication or ordered published for purposes of rule 8.1115.

IN THE COURT OF APPEAL OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA

FIRST APPELLATE DISTRICT

DIVISION TWO

THE PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Respondent, A163959 v. MICHAEL DANIEL MARTIN, (Napa County Super. Ct. No. 19CR003514) Defendant and Appellant.

A jury convicted defendant Michael Daniel Martin of attempted murder and four other crimes, and found true various enhancements. The trial court sentenced him to an indeterminate term of 14 years to life in prison, plus a determinate term of 13 years and 4 months in prison. On appeal, defendant raises a number of evidentiary and instructional challenges. He also argues, and the People agree, his sentence must be vacated in light of ameliorative changes on two different sentencing schemes applicable to his case. We affirm defendant’s convictions, but vacate his sentence and remand the matter to allow the trial court to resentence him under current sentencing laws. BACKGROUND The charges against defendant arose from allegations that on the evening of December 11, 2019, he drove his then wife, Heather Robinson, to a

remote location up in the hills in the City of Napa, punched and strangled her while inside the vehicle, and then struck her with the vehicle as she tried to escape, causing her to fall down a ravine and sustain serious injuries. Defendant’s defense at trial was that Robinson drove herself over the ravine, and that he was not near the accident site at the time. The Evidence The Prosecution Case Heather Robinson In early 2015, Robinson began a relationship with defendant, then a patient at a drug and alcohol treatment facility where Robinson was working. Some time that year, defendant moved in with Robinson in her apartment in Napa. On October 4, 2015, Robinson, a former addict who had been sober for about two decades, relapsed with alcohol. Realizing she was drunk, Robinson went into her bathroom. Defendant came in and “lined up some meth.” Upset by this, Robinson hit the mirror and knocked the methamphetamine away. Defendant then hit Robinson and put his hand over her throat so that she could not breathe. Robinson repeated to defendant, “[Y]ou’re killing me.” She then passed out. When Robinson woke up, she looked in the mirror and saw she had bruises all over her face and a black eye, and one of her eyes was shut closed. Robinson told her boss she had relapsed and quit her job. She did not report the incident to the police. After a few weeks had passed, Robinson stayed at her sister’s house for a couple of days. After that she stayed at a homeless shelter for victims of domestic violence for another several days. Robinson did not leave the relationship with defendant, despite being told by others to do so, because she

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“is a policy argument that should be directed to the Legislature. This court’s function is to interpret the law, not pass on its wisdom.” Finally, we disagree with defendant that Kelly’s testimony should have been excluded as improper profile evidence. “A profile ordinarily constitutes a set of circumstances—some innocuous—characteristic of certain crimes or criminals, said to comprise a typical pattern of behavior. In profile testimony, the expert compares the behavior of the defendant to the pattern or profile and concludes the defendant fits the profile.” (Prince, supra, 40 Cal.4th at p. 1226.) Defendant relies primarily on People v. Robbie (2001) 92 Cal.App.4th 1075, 1084 (Robbie), which holds that “[p]rofile evidence is generally inadmissible to prove guilt.” In Robbie, the defendant was charged with kidnapping for sexual purposes and other sex offenses. (Id. at pp. 1077– 1078.) At trial, the defendant maintained that his sexual encounter with the victim was consensual. (Id. at pp. 1079–1080.) In an effort to overcome this defense, the prosecution offered an expert on sexual offenders “to testify that . . . defendant’s conduct was consistent with being a rapist.” (Id. at p. 1081.) In the form of hypothetical questions asked by the prosecutor, the expert testified that many rapists use only minimal force, and described in detail a scenario in which the rapist is in effect acting as if he thinks of the sexual acts as consensual. (Id. at pp. 1082–1084.) Not coincidentally, the behavior the expert described matched the testimony of the alleged victim. Then, when asked “what if any conclusion do you reach about that conduct?” the expert answered, “That it’s the most prevalent type of behavior pattern that I have seen with sex offenders. It’s the most common type of behavior pattern.” (Id. at p. 1083.) The Court of Appeal in Robbie characterized this evidence as inadmissible “profile evidence.” It explained: “[The evidence]

behaviors that paralleled Robinson’s descriptions of defendant’s conduct towards her. However, this testimony was always given in the context of explaining the impact such behaviors would likely have on a victim. As she put it, the “power and control tactics wheel” is a tool to “help . . . understand why someone is either staying in a relationship or denying that there is violence in a relationship. So this is a . . . visual relationship of some tactics that we will often see but it’s not . . . a clear-cut science that we’re going to see this every time.” In addition, Kelly who had never met defendant, did not suggest that any behaviors that could be attributed to defendant were the “most prevalent” or the “most common” type seen in abusers. Nor did she offer an opinion as to whether such behaviors established that defendant was an abuser. Instead, Kelly explained that not all of the power and control tactics are present in every case of domestic violence, because “[t]he dynamics of every relationship is different.” “[S]ome of these tactics may be used by some perpetrators of domestic violence and not by others. Some of them may not apply.” She also explained that not every domestic violence case involves physical injury. Additionally, Kelly testified there is no particular profile of a domestic violence victim. Thus, even though parts of Kelly’s testimony appear at first blush to fit the “profile” mold, in fact they do not. For similar reasons, defendant also misplaces reliance on People v. Martinez (1992) 10 Cal.App.4th 1001 (Martinez). There, the defendant was arrested for driving a stolen truck. (Id. at p. 1003.) The Martinez court held the trial court erred in permitting the prosecution to introduce the testimony of highway patrol investigators regarding theft rings that transported stolen vehicles to Central America to prove the defendant knew the car he bought was stolen. (Id. at pp. 1007–1008.) Here, as we have already stated, Kelly’s testimony was not used to show that defendant fit the profile of a criminal

defendant’s federal constitutional rights are violated by an evidence rule under which the defendant may not introduce proof of third-party guilt if the prosecution has introduced forensic evidence that, if believed, strongly supports a guilty verdict.” (Holmes, supra, 547 U.S. at p. 321.) Holmes held that this rule was “ ‘arbitrary,’ ” reversed the judgment, and remanded for further proceedings. (Id. at p. 331.) Here, defendant does not even attempt to argue the trial court’s reliance on California’s hearsay restrictions can be equated or even analogized to the South Carolina rule at issue in Holmes. In Chambers, the defendant was charged with murder, but another person confessed to friends that he was the killer and later signed a sworn confession. When called as a witness by the defense, however, the person repudiated his confessions. The state court prevented the defense from impeaching its own witness under an antiquated state rule of evidence, and excluded the confessions because Mississippi had no exception to the hearsay rule for statements against penal interest. (Chambers, supra, 410 U.S. at pp. 291–295, 299.) The United States Supreme Court concluded that the defendant’s right to due process had been violated because the evidence was critical, and the combination of two dubious rules of evidence compelled the state court to ignore overwhelming indicia that the hearsay confessions were reliable. (Id. at pp. 297–298, 302– 303.) The court emphasized that the confessions were spontaneous and corroborated by other evidence, including eyewitness testimony. (Id., at pp. 294, 300.) Chambers, however, “was an exercise in highly case-specific error correction.” (Montana v. Egelhoff (1996) 518 U.S. 37, 52.) “[T]he holding of Chambers—if one can be discerned from such a fact-intensive case—is certainly not that a defendant is denied ‘a fair opportunity to defend against the State’s accusations’ whenever ‘critical evidence’ favorable to him is

IN THE COURT OF APPEAL OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA

FIRST APPELLATE DISTRICT

DIVISION TWO

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