People v. Anthony R.People v. Anthony R.
Opinion
This juvеnile appeal deals with a post-Proposition 8 construction of Penal Code section 666. The section states: “Every person who, having been convicted of petit theft, grand theft, burglary, or robbery and having served a term therefor in any penal institution or having been imprisoned therein as a condition of probation for such offense, is subsequently convicted of petit theft, then the person convicted of such subsequent offense is punishable by imprisonment in the county jail not exceeding one year, or in the state prison.” (Italics added.)
The 17-year-old appellant was continued as a ward of the court pursuant to a sustained supplemental petition filed February 23, 1983, charging appellant with committing a petit theft, “having been previously convicted of the crime of Petty Theft on the 7th day of July, 1981, in the Juvenile Court of the Superior Court of the State of California and having thereafter served a term therefor in a penal institution and having been
Appellant, a California Youth Authority (CYA) parolee, was recommitted to the CYA on May 24, 1983, for a term nоt to exceed three years (
Appellant now alleges, that as a matter of law, he cоuld not be found to have violated Penal Code
Appellant, age 15 on July 7, 1981, was never “convicted” of a burglary (see fn. 1) that date. Nor was appellant, age 17 on May 10, 1983, “convicted” of a petit theft on that date. Both hearings were juvenile court jurisdictional hearings at which allegations of supplemental petitions of the juvenile court were found to be true. As a result, appellant’s juvenile court wardship was continued on both occasiоns.
Welfare and Institutions Code section 203 provides that “[a]n order adjudging a minor to be a ward of the juvenile court shall not be deemed a conviction of a crime for any purpose, nor shall a proceeding in the juvenilе court be deemed a criminal proceeding.” Contrary to respondent’s argu
Welfare and Institutions Code
Subdivision (f) of article I, section 28 provides: “Any prior felony conviction of any person in any criminal proceeding, whether adult or juvenile, shall subsequently be used without limitation for purposes of impeachment or enhancement of sentence in any criminal proceeding. When a prior felony conviction is an element of any felony offense, it shall be proven to the trier of fact in open court.”
It is apparent that the first sentence of subdivision (f) addresses the use of prior convictions for one of two specific, narrow purposes, impeachment or enhancement, neither of which is involved in the present case. It is patent that appellant’s prior adjudication is not being used for impеachment purposes. It is equally clear that it is not being used to enhance.
The term “enhancement” has a well-established meaning in California law. It is defined as “an additional term of imprisonment added to the base term” for the particular offense. (Rule 405(c), Cal. Rules of Court; see
People
v.
Lawson
(1980)
It is worth noting that even if respondent’s Proposition 8 “conversion” interpretation were adopted, subdivision (f) of article I, section 28 covers the use of
prior
convictions. It could not possibly be authority for transforming appellant’s
current
adjudication into a conviction. This being the case, Penal Code
Although it is not entirely clear, respondent’s argument may be not that subdivision (f), of article I, section 28 applies literally to our case but that it evinces a broad, albeit implied, electoral intent to do away with Welfare and Institutions Code
Our position that the Victims’ Bill of Rights did not intend to transform juvenile adjudications into criminal convictions is further supported by language found in other portions of the amendment which draws a distinction between juvenile and adult court proceedings. (See, e.g., subd. (d), of article I, § 28, “. . . relevant evidence shall not be excluded in any сriminal proceeding, including pretrial and post conviction motions and hearings, or in any trial or hearing of a juvenile for a criminal offense, whether heard in juvenile or adult court”; and subd. (a) of newly added
Otherwise stated, as Justice Gates explained in a discussion of Welfare and Institutions Code section 702 in
In re Michael S.
(1983)
The primary goal in construing constitutional amendments is to “avoid absurd results and to fulfill the apparent intent of the framers.”
(Amador Valley Joint Union High Sch. Dist.
v.
State Bd. of Equalization
(1978)
As a matter of law, the minor’s continued wardship was erroneously based upon a finding his conduct came within the provisions of Penal Code
The jurisdictional finding of May 10, 1983, is modified to reflect a finding apрellant came within the provisions of Welfare and Institutions Code section 602 as a result of conduct described in Penal Code
Notes
Before Brown (G. A.), P. J., Zenovich, J., and Andreen, J.
Appellant was not adjudicated a ward pursuant to a petit theft finding on July 7, 1981. An allegation of petit theft was contained in a four count petition dated June 29, 1981, alleging appellant had committed three counts of burglary and one count of petit theft. At the jurisdictional hearing on July 7, 1981, appellant admitted two of the burglary counts and denied the petit theft. As to that petition, the court only found true the two burglaries so admitted.
Appellant’s commitment to the California Youth Authority was based upon the two sustained burglaries plus findings pertaining to vehicle theft and driving without a license stemming from two other petitions. A joint dispositional hearing was held as to the sustained allegations of all three petitions on July 21, 1981, at which time no term of commitment was imposed for a petit theft offense.
Without specifically raising the point, the deputy attorney general appears to try to rectify the problem by noting at the time of the petit theft “conviction” appellant was “convicted” of “burglary involving theft,” and thereafter refers to the prior “conviction” as a “burglary/theft.” The testimony of a probation officer at the instant jurisdictional hearing established appellant had sustained two prior “convictions” for burglary; the officer noted appellant’s record did not reflect a prior petit theft “conviction.”
Defense counsel below never objected to the variance between the proof at hearing and the petition as alleged, i.e., a prior burglary versus a prior petit theft. (See
All further article/section references are to the California Constitution.
Respondent’s argument concеrning subdivision (f) of article I, section 28 is rather nonspecific. Therefore, we will simply attempt to explain all of the reasons why the amendment is inapplicable in the instant case.
It is unnecessary for our resolution of this case to address the question of whether service of a term of commitment in the CYA for burglary constitutes “having served a term therefor in any penal institution” within the meaning of Penal Code
The minor has already served a commitment period аt CYA beyond the six-month maximum commitment term for petit theft. He entered the Stockton facility on August 25, 1983, and was still residing there as of March 1, 1984. However, the matter of any remaining parole period under the minor’s July 21, 1981, CYA commitment remains to be resolved.