THE PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. SCOTT FRANK FIALHO, Defendant and Appellant.
No. H038119
Sixth Dist.
Sept. 23, 2014
229 Cal. App. 4th 1389
Gordon S. Brownell, under appointment by the Court of Appeal, for Defendant and Appellant.
Kamala D. Harris, Attorney General, Dane R. Gillette, Chief Assistant Attorney General, Gerald A. Engler, Assistant Attorney General, Catherine A. Rivlin and Gregg E. Zywicke, Deputy Attorneys General, for Plaintiff and Respondent.
OPINION
BAMATTRE-MANOUKIAN, Acting P. J.—
I. INTRODUCTION
Defendant Scott Frank Fialho appeals after a jury convicted him of voluntary manslaughter (
On appeal, defendant contends we should vacate the jury‘s findings on the
II. BACKGROUND
A. The Shooting3
On December 5, 2007, San Jose police officers were dispatched to an apartment complеx in San Jose, where they found 19-year-old Huber Virelas lying on the ground with a gunshot wound to his left eye. The police also found 25-year-old Roberto Jaime on the ground with gunshot wounds in his arm, chest, abdomen, and back. The two victims were transported to the hospital, and Virelas subsequently died.
Prior to the shooting, a witness heard defendant ask Virelas “Do you bang?” and saw defendant pull out a handgun and shoot Virelas in the head. The witness also saw defendant shoot Jaime.
According to another witness, defendant—a Norteño gang member—believed the two victims—both Sureño gang members—had been ” ‘mugging’ ” him prior to the shooting.
At defendant‘s residence, police found bloody items, “items indicative of gang activity,” and a bullet.
Defendant was arrested on January 16, 2008. Defendant attempted to flee when officers arrived at his location in an attempt to contact him. Defendant had a large knife on his person at the time of his arrest.
B. Charges
Defendant was charged with murder (
As to the murder charged in count 1, the first amended information alleged that defendant was an active participant in a criminal street gang and that the murder was carried out to further the gang‘s activities (
As to the attempted murder charged in count 2, the first amended information alleged that defendant personally and intentionally discharged a firearm and proximately caused great bodily injury (
The first amended information also alleged that defendant committed counts 3, 4, and 5 for the benefit of a criminal street gang. (
C. Verdicts
In count 1, the jury found defendant not guilty of first degree murder and not guilty of second degree murder, but it found him guilty of voluntary manslaughter. (
In count 2, the jury found defendant not guilty of attempted murder, but it found him guilty of attempted voluntary manslaughter. (
In count 4, the jury found defendant guilty of carrying a concealed dirk or dagger (former
In count 5, the jury found defendant guilty of resisting an officer (
D. Sentencing
The probation report noted that the jury had found true the allegations under
On Novеmber 18, 2011, the trial court sentenced defendant to the upper term of 11 years for count 1 (voluntary manslaughter) with a consecutive upper term of 10 years for personal firearm use pursuant to former
On December 2, 2011, the trial court recalled defendant‘s sentence (see
On March 23, 2012, the trial court reimposed the 26-year sentence.
III. DISCUSSION
Defendant contends we should vacate the jury‘s findings on the
Defendant is correct that
Defendant concedes the evidence established that he “use[d]” a firearm within the meaning of former
Defendant also concedes there is precedent in case law for imposition of uncharged but ” ‘lesser included enhancements’ ” (see People v. Majors (1998) 18 Cal.4th 385, 410 [75 Cal.Rptr.2d 684, 956 P.2d 1137] (Majors)) when the original enhancement allegation is either factually unsupported or—as here—does not apply to the offense of conviction under the applicable statutory provisions. In fact, the California Supreme Court has expressly permitted substitution of a charged enhancement with an uncharged enhancement that “would be applicable in any case” in which the charged enhancement applies. (People v. Strickland (1974) 11 Cal.3d 946, 961 [114 Cal.Rptr. 632, 523 P.2d 672] (Strickland).) In Strickland, the defendant was charged with murder, but he was convicted of voluntary manslaughter, a lesser included offense. The jury fоund true a firearm use allegation under former section 12022.5, which at that time applied to murder but not manslaughter, so the trial court had improperly imposed that enhancement. (Strickland, supra, at p. 959.) The California Supreme Court instead imposed an arming enhancement under former section 12022, explaining, ” ‘In the present case appellant did not come within the provisions of section 12022.5, as the crime of which he was convicted was not specified in that section, but the jury did find that he used and thus was armed with a firearm, a shotgun, at the time the offense was committed. Appellant was charged in the commission with the use of a firearm under section 12022.5, [and] thus had notice that his conduct [could] also be in violation of section 12022.’ ” (Strickland, supra, at p. 961, first bracketed insertion added.)
The Courts of Appeal have similarly approved the substitution of a charged enhancement with an uncharged ” ‘lesser included enhancement’ ” (Majors, supra, 18 Cal.4th at p. 410) when there is insufficient evidence to support the greater enhancement. In People v. Allen (1985) 165 Cal.App.3d 616, 627 [211 Cal.Rptr. 837] (Allen), the appellate court found insufficient evidence to support a firearm use enhancement under former
Defendant contends that Strickland, Allen, and Lucas do not control here because those cases were decided prior to the enactment of
We do not agree with defendant that Strickland was, in effect, legislatively overruled by the enactment of the сurrent version of
We also conclude that
Further, nothing in the plain language of
Finally, even if
In this case, the trial court did not err by imposing a personal firearm use enhancement under former
IV. DISPOSITION
The judgment is affirmed.
Grover, J., concurred.
MÁRQUEZ, J., Concurring.—I respectfully concur in the judgment only. I agree with my colleagues that defendant‘s 26-year sentence—which included firearm enhancements adding more than 13 years to defendant‘s base terms—must be affirmed. But in my view, defendant‘s argument that the trial court erred when it imposed sentences on Penal Code former
Defendant‘s argument is based on
The plain language of
The Legislature enacted the current version of
I agree with the majority that the imposition of more than 14 years of enhancements in this case—based upon the “lesser included enhancement” set forth in former section 12022.5—did not violate notice requirements of due process or defendant‘s right to a jury trial. But I would conclude that the plain language of
It may be that the Legislature, by imposing specific pleading requirements for enhancements, intended to preclude the same kind of ” ‘all-or-nothing’ ” choice that juries face when they are not instructed on a lesser included offense that is supported by the evidence. (People v. Banks (2014) 59 Cal.4th 1113, 1159-1160 [176 Cal.Rptr.3d 185, 331 P.3d 1206] [“The rule that juries must be instructed on lesser included offenses “рrevents either party,
The Legislature may also have found it desirable to apprise defendants explicitly of the various enhancements upon which they could be sentenced, which impose wide-ranging consequences. The firearm enhancements at issue in this appeal illustrate the point. Under the firearm enhancement found true by the jury, defendant faced an additional and consecutive term of 25 years to life for a single violation. (Former
Notwithstanding the failure to allege the former
Appellant‘s petition for review by the Supreme Court was denied December 17, 2014, S222295.
Notes
As to count 2, the enhancement allegation read as follows: “It is further alleged that in the commission of a felony specified in subdivision (a), and charged above, the defendant... personally and intentionally discharged а firearm, a handgun, and proximately caused... the great bodily injury, as defined in Penal Code section 12022.7, to [the second victim], a person other than an accomplice within the meaning of Penal Code sections 12022.53(d) . . . .”
