THE PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. NAHEED MOHMOUD HAMED, Defendant and Appellant.
No. H039223
Sixth Dist.
Nov. 26, 2013
221 Cal. App. 4th 928
Michael E. Allen, 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, Eric D. Share and Ronald E. Niver, Deputy Attorneys General, for Plaintiff and Respondent.
OPINION
MÁRQUEZ, J.—Defendant Naheed Mohmoud Hamed was convicted by jury of one count of possessing child pornography (
We hold that the court erred in both the manner in which it imposed the sex offender fine and in determining the amount of the penalty assessments attached thereto. We will therefore modify the judgment to impose a sex offender fine of $300, plus penalty assessments of $900, a net difference of $30. We will also direct the trial court clerk to prepare an amended abstract of judgment that sets forth the amounts and statutory bases of the sex offender fine and each of the penalty assessments imposed.
FACTS & PROCEDURAL HISTORY
On March 5, 2012, about 11:30 p.m., Monterey Police Officer Chad Ventimiglia pulled over the BMW defendant was driving for a speeding violation (traveling 80 miles per hour on a freeway). As Officer Ventimiglia spoke to defendant, he smelled marijuana. The officer asked defendant if he had any drugs in the car; defendant admitted that he had marijuana. Officer Ventimiglia requested defendant‘s identification, determined that he was on active parole, did a parole search of the car, and found marijuana residue in the passenger compartment. Officer Ventimiglia and another officer, Amy Carrizosa, then searched the trunk of the BMW. In a duffel bag inside the trunk, they found about 100 photographs depicting naked male and female children of various ages, ranging from infants to teens, engaged in sexual acts, often with adults. The photos had been printed from a variety of Internet Web sites. Defendant was arrested at the scene.
While being transported to jail, defendant told Officer Carrizosa the photos were not his; he said he found them in the car, which belonged to the auto dealership where he worked. But when Officer Ventimiglia interviewed defendant at the police station, he told two different stories. Initially, he said he got the photos from a friend‘s computer; later, he said he printed them at work. When Officer Ventimiglia confronted defendant with these discrepancies, defendant said he lied to Officer Carrizosa because he “didn‘t want to get his friend in trouble.”
Case No. SS120428A—Possession of Child Pornography
Defendant was charged by information with one count of possession of child pornography (
Defendant filed a motion to suppress the pornographic photographs obtained from the search of his trunk. At the hearing on that motion, defendant testified that he could not have been driving 80 miles per hour because a “governor” had been installed on the BMW, which limited its speed to 72 miles per hour. He submitted an exhibit that purported to be an invoice prepared by the company that manufactured the governor (hereafter Exhibit A). The court denied the motion, stating that it found Exhibit A “quite concerning” because the font in the entry describing the “speed limiter program” was different from the font used in the rest of the invoice. The court also found Officer Ventimiglia‘s testimony credible.
The case went to trial before a jury. After the jury found defendant guilty on the possession of child pornography count, defendant waived a jury trial on the prison prior allegation and admitted that allegation.
Case No. SS122230A—Perjury and False Evidence
Prior to sentencing in the possession of child pornography case, the prosecution filed a new complaint, charging defendant with three offenses arising out of his conduct at the hearing on the motion to suppress. The complaint charged defendant with one felony count of perjury under oath (
In January 2013, pursuant to a negotiated disposition, defendant pleaded no contest to offering false evidence (
Sentencing in Both Cases
The court sentenced defendant in both cases on January 11, 2013. In case No. SS120428A, the court imposed the upper term of three years for possession of child pornography, plus one year for the prison prior. In case No. SS122230A, pursuant to the negotiated plea, the court sentenced defendant to eight months for offering false evidence, consecutive to the sentence in the child pornography case. The total term was four years eight months. The court also imposed various fines and fees, including a $1,230 sex offender fine pursuant to
DISCUSSION
The sole issue on appeal is defendant‘s challenge to the $1,230 sex offender fine imposed pursuant to
Contentions
Defendant concedes that possession of child pornography (
Defendant argues that these circumstances permitted a $300 sex offender fine, but the court erred when it ordered him to pay $1,230 pursuant to
The Attorney General agrees that the
Fine Imposed in This Case
In the presentencing report, the probation officer recommended that defendant “Pay a 290.3 PC fine of $1,230.00,” as well as other fines and fees not at issue on appeal. The probation report did not contain the words “penalty assessments” or an explanation of how the probation officer determined the amount of the
In its oral pronouncement of judgment, the court stated, “You‘re ordered to pay [a] fine of $1,230 pursuant to Penal Code Section 290.3.” The minutes of
The High Case
Defendant relies on People v. High (2004) 119 Cal.App.4th 1192, 1200 [15 Cal.Rptr.3d 148] (High), where the appellate court held the trial court had erred “in the manner in which [it] handled the monetary assessments” at sentencing. The court observed: “Instead of reading the separate fines, fees, penalties and surcharges into the record at sentencing, the court simply stated: ‘The court will impose a theft fine pursuant to [
On this record, the court in High concluded as follows: “Although we recognize that a detailed recitation of all the fees, fines and penalties on the record may be tedious, California law does not authorize shortcuts. All fines and fees must be set forth in the abstract of judgment. [Citations.] The abstract of judgment form used here, Judicial Council form CR-290 (rev. Jan. 1, 2003) provides a number of lines for ‘other’ financial obligations in addition to those delineated with statutory references on the preprinted form. If the abstract does not specify the amount of each fine, the Department of Corrections cannot fulfill its statutory duty to collect and forward deductions from prisoner wages to the appropriate agency. [Citation.] At a minimum, the inclusion of all fines and fees in the abstract may assist state and local agencies in their collection efforts. (
Penalty Assessments
High thus held that all fines are part of the judgment, which the abstract of judgment must digest or summarize. (High, supra, 119 Cal.App.4th at
In People v. Castellanos (2009) 175 Cal.App.4th 1524, 1528-1530 [98 Cal.Rptr.3d 1] (Castellanos), the Second District Court of Appeal pointed out that the $10 crime prevention program fine imposed pursuant to
The seven “penalty assessments” identified in Castellanos and Sharret include (1) a 100 percent state penalty assessment (
Various cases have applied these penalty assessments to four different types of fines. Castellanos applied them to the $10 crime prevention program fine for defendants who commit theft offenses (
Several variables affect the amount of penalty assessments. The Castellanos court observed that the “total due may vary depending on whether the trial court selects $10 as the amount of the
As noted, various cases have identified at least four base fines that are subject to penalty assessments and there are currently seven different penalty assessments—some of which vary depending on the county where the fine is imposed—that may apply to a particular fine. Because the statutes imposing these penalty assessments have been enacted and amended over time, the question whether a particular penalty assessment applies and the amount of
Base Fines and Penalty Assessments Must Be Enumerated in the Judgment and Listed on the Abstract
In High, the court held that penalty assessments must be (1) specified in the court‘s oral pronouncement of judgment, and (2) specifically listed in the abstract of judgment. (High, supra, 119 Cal.App.4th at pp. 1200–1201.) The manner in which the sex offender fine was imposed here is similar to the way some of the fines were imposed by the trial court in High. In that case, the trial court imposed a “‘theft fine pursuant to . . . section 1202.5 . . . of $34,’ ” “‘a criminal laboratory analysis fee in the total sum of $510, a drug program fee, together with surcharges and penalties in the total sum of $1,530, [and] a clandestine drug lab fine, together with penalties, assessments and surcharges totaling $1,700.‘” (High, supra, 119 Cal.App.4th at p. 1200.) As the court observed in High, “[i]nstead of reading the separate fines, fees, penalties and surcharges into the record at sentencing,” the trial court simply described the base fine at issue, without specifying the statutory basis for three of the fines, and stated the total amount imposed, which appears to be the sum of the base fine plus penalty assessments times the number of applicable counts. (Ibid.) For two of the fines, the trial court stated that the amounts imposed included penalty assessments. For the other two fines, the trial court did not state whether the order included penalty assessments, although the amounts imposed suggest that it did. After striking some of the penalty assessments on some of the counts on ex post facto grounds (id. at pp. 1195–1199), the appellate court held that all fines and fees must be set forth in the abstract of judgment (id. at p. 1200) and remanded to the trial court to “separately list, with the statutory basis, all fines, fees and penalties imposed on each count” and “to prepare an amended abstract” of judgment (id. at p. 1201).
The order here, which imposes a
In Sharret, the appellate court approved a procedure whereby the “trial court orally imposed the $50 criminal laboratory analysis fee ([
In Voit, the trial court followed the procedure approved in Sharret and orally imposed a sex offender fine of $500 for a second offense under
The trial court order and the abstract of judgment here did not comply with the procedural requirements in High, Sharret, or Voit. Assuming the trial court meant to impose a $300 base fine (
Both High and Sharret address two different aspects of the sentencing process: (1) the oral pronouncement of judgment by the sentencing judge, and (2) the preparation of the abstract of judgment by the court clerk. High says that a sentencing court should make a “detailed recitation of all the fees, fines and penalties on the record” and requires that “[a]ll fines and fees must be set forth in the abstract of judgment.” (High, supra, 119 Cal.App.4th at p. 1200.) The court recognized that such a detailed recitation “may be tedious,” but
As for the oral pronouncement of judgment, we note that when High was decided in June 2004, there were only four penalty assessments. This area has become more complex since then, with the addition of three more penalty assessments6 and multiple amendments to the statutes that impose base fines and penalty assessments. In light of this history, additional fines and penalty assessments—or amendments to those already in existence—may be enacted by the Legislature in the years to come.
Appellate courts are often called upon to correct sentences that contain errors in fines and penalty assessments. Common recurring errors include the imposition of penalty assessments or base fines that did not apply at the time of the offense and are, therefore, prohibited on ex post facto grounds (see, e.g., Voit, supra, 200 Cal.App.4th at p. 1374; High, supra, 119 Cal.App.4th at pp. 1195–1199; Valenzuela, at pp. 1249–1250), as well as the failure to impose mandatory penalty assessments (see, e.g., Castellanos, supra, 175 Cal.App.4th at pp. 1527–1530; Valenzuela, supra, 172 Cal.App.4th at pp. 1249–1250). Many of these errors could be caught and corrected in the trial court.
A detailed description of the amount of and statutory basis for the fines and penalty assessments imposed would help the parties and the court avoid errors in this area. For example, if the probation report in this case had contained a detailed list of the component parts of the sex offender fine and the penalty assessments attached thereto, perhaps one of the parties would have caught the $30 error that is now the subject of this appeal. A trial court could recite the amount and statutory basis for any base fine and the amounts and statutory bases for any penalty assessments on the record, as High suggests should be done. (High, supra, 119 Cal.App.4th at p. 1200.) Or, in cases where the amounts and statutory bases for the penalty assessments have been set forth in a probation report, a sentencing memorandum, or some other
As for the abstract of judgment, both High and Sharret require the court clerk to list the amount and statutory basis for each base fine and the amount and statutory basis for each penalty assessment in the abstract of judgment. As the court stated in High, this assists the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation to “fulfill its statutory duty to collect and forward deductions from prisoner wages to the appropriate agency.” (High, supra, 119 Cal.App.4th at p. 1200.)
The judgment here must be modified because the sentencing court did not impose the correct amount for the
Amount of Base Fine and Penalty Assessments
At the time of defendant‘s offense (Mar. 5, 2012), the correct amount of the
“[A]n unauthorized sentence may be corrected at any time even if there was no objection in the trial court. [Citations.] Such an unauthorized sentence may be corrected even when raised for the first time on appeal. [Citations.]” (Valenzuela, supra, 172 Cal.App.4th at p. 1249, citing In re Sheena K. (2007) 40 Cal.4th 875, 886 [55 Cal.Rptr.3d 716, 153 P.3d 282], and People v. Smith (2001) 24 Cal.4th 849, 854 [102 Cal.Rptr.2d 731, 14 P.3d 942].) Both the imposition of a
DISPOSITION
The judgment is modified to impose a sex offender fine of $300 pursuant to
The clerk of the trial court is directed to prepare an amended abstract of judgment that sets forth the amount of and statutory basis for the sex offender
Bamattre-Manoukian, Acting P. J., and Grover, J., concurred.
