People v. Cervantes CA4/1

Filed 2/27/24 P. v. Cervantes CA4/1 NOT TO BE PUBLISHED IN OFFICIAL REPORTS California Rules of Court, rule 8.1115(a), prohibits courts and parties from citing or relying on opinions not certified for publication or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 This opinion has not been certified for publication or ordered published for purposes of rule 8.1115.

COURT OF APPEAL, FOURTH APPELLATE DISTRICT

DIVISION ONE

STATE OF CALIFORNIA

THE PEOPLE, D081281

Plaintiff and Respondent,

v. (Super. Ct. No. SCD294710) ALEXIS V. CERVANTES,

Defendant and Appellant.

APPEAL from a judgment of the Superior Court of San Diego County, Kimberlee A. Lagotta, Judge. Affirmed. Britton Donaldson, under appointment by the Court of Appeal, for Defendant and Appellant. Rob Bonta, Attorney General, Lance E. Winters, Chief Assistant Attorney General, Charles C. Ragland, Assistant Attorney General, Paige B. Hazard and Heather B. Arambarri, Deputy Attorneys General, for Plaintiff and Respondent. Alexis V. Cervantes appeals from a judgment following a conviction on one count of inflicting corporal injury to a dating partner in violation of

section 273.5, subdivision (a), of the Penal Code.1 Cervantes acknowledges that he stabbed his boyfriend, B.D. But he contends that he did so in self- defense and that the conviction should be reversed because there is no substantial evidence that he acted other than in self-defense. The Attorney General disagrees, and so do we. Hence we affirm the conviction. B.D. sustained his injuries inside a tent that he shared with Cervantes, his dating partner, in a homeless encampment and in which the two of them had quarreled and fought shortly before the stabbing. Although there were no eyewitnesses to the quarrel, to the fight or to the stabbing that ensued, two individuals occupying the neighboring tent testified at trial that they had heard, that night, what sounded like two men scuffling in the tent, followed by a period of “complete[ ] quiet” estimated to have lasted between 2 and 10 minutes, and then cries along the lines of “ ‘You stabbed me!’ ” or “ ‘Get off me. Help. I’ve been stabbed.’ ” These two witnesses also testified that, during some portion of this time, they (in the case of one witness) heard or (in the case of the other witness) saw the tent moving or shaking “pretty drastically.” One of these witnesses further testified that, shortly after the events described above, he had seen the two men exit the tent, with B.D. bleeding and Cervantes helping B.D. This same witness also testified that Cervantes had said, “Don’t call the police.” A trauma surgeon testified that the injuries sustained by B.D. included multiple severe stab wounds requiring emergency surgery and that one of these wounds involved “evisceration, meaning an inside the body organ is now in the outside the body world” and was potentially life-threatening. A police officer testified that he had interviewed Cervantes on the night of the