THE PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Appellant, v. WILLIAM F. LEVINS, as Magistrate, etc., Defendant and Respondent; REGINALD HARRIS, Real Party in Interest and Respondent.
S.F. No. 23630
Supreme Court of California
Nov. 9, 1978.
December 13, 1978
22 Cal.3d 620 | 150 Cal.Rptr. 458 | 586 P.2d 939
James M. Cramer, District Attorney (San Bernardino), and Joseph A. Burns, Deputy District Attorney, as Amici Curiae on behalf of Plaintiff and Appellant.
Mintz, Giller, Himmelman & Mintz, Richard S. Kessler, James Giller, Ephraim Margolin and Nicholas C. Arguimbau for Defendant and Respondent.
No appearance for Real Party in Interest and Respondent.
Sheldon Portman, Public Defender (Santa Clara), William Sheffield, Fred Okrand, Margaret C. Crosby and Alan L. Schlosser as Amici Curiae on behalf of Defendant and Respondent and Real Party in Interest and Respondent.
MOSK, J.- The People ask us to consider whether a magistrate abused his discretion in denying a motion to dismiss a criminal complaint under
This situation arises in the context of the underlying controversy over the constitutionality of the grand jury‘s indicting function as presently performed, an issue now resolved in Hawkins v. Superior Court (1978) ante, page 584 [150 Cal.Rptr. 435, 586 P.2d 916], and the interpretation of
On October 9, 1975, the District Attorney of Alameda County filed felony complaint No. 88508 against Reginald Harris, real party in interest here, in the Municipal Court for the Oakland-Piedmont Judicial District. The charge was violation of
On October 30, the date scheduled for the preliminary hearing on the earlier complaint, the district attorney moved in municipal court for its dismissal, citing the supervening indictment. The magistrate, the Honorable William P. Levins, took the motion under submission.1 A hearing was held on November 3, at which defendant opposed the motion to dismiss, insisting that he was entitled to a preliminary hearing, and that “to so deprive him [of that hearing] by proceeding at the grand jury level is a denial of . . . equal protection.”
When defendant Harris’ case was called on November 6, the district attorney announced that he was not ready to proceed, and renewed his motion to dismiss. He stated that it was his understanding that “jurisdiction now resides in the Superior Court,” that to deny his motion “would be in excess of the Court‘s jurisdiction,” and would produce “a dual prosecution under [Penal Code section] 654.” Again the motion to dismiss was denied, the court repeating its intent to proceed with a preliminary hearing on the complaint, and threatening to hold the deputy district attorney in contempt if he failed to produce witnesses or in the alternative did not obtain a writ “to prevent me from acting.”
The district attorney then sought a writ of prohibition or mandate in the superior court, the court to which the grand jury indictment had been returned. That court, treating the prosecutor‘s motion to dismiss as one under
The parties agree that the prosecutor‘s motion before the magistrate to dismiss the complaint was an invocation of
In People v. Peters, supra, at page 753, however, a majority of this court held that ”
Under compulsion of Peters, then, it is clear that the magistrate did not have the power to grant the prosecutor‘s motion to dismiss, and thus the denial was entirely proper.
In the superior court, the People made no motion to dismiss under
Had the magistrate granted the motion of the People to dismiss, according to Peters, he would have acted in excess of his jurisdiction; thus the refusal to dismiss was consistent with his jurisdictional limits. Because a writ is not appropriate to compel a magistrate to dismiss a case, the superior court properly denied the writ.
The judgment of the superior court denying the writ is affirmed.
Manuel, J., and Newman, J., concurred.
RICHARDSON, J.—I concur in the judgment. However, for the reasons stated in my dissenting opinion in Hawkins v. Superior Court (1978) ante, p. 584 [150 Cal.Rptr. 435, 586 P.2d 916], defendant herein had no constitutional right to a postindictment preliminary examination. Accordingly, the People were entitled to abandon the proceedings in municipal court after obtaining an indictment from the grand jury.
Clark, J., concurred.
Tobriner, J., concurred.
NEWMAN, J.—I concur with Justice Mosk. I do not agree with Justice Richardson‘s view, rejected by the majority in Hawkins v. Superior Court (1978) ante, p. 584 [150 Cal.Rptr. 435, 586 P.2d 916], that defendant here had no right to a postindictment preliminary examination.
Interestingly, to support their contention that such a right does exist, the American Civil Liberties Union Foundations of Northern and Southern California, participating here as amici, suggested that this court consider the juridical impact of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and related documents. (Their brief cites inter alia art. 9(4) of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights; cf. Bixby v. Pierno (1971) 4 Cal.3d 130, 143, fn. 9 [93 Cal.Rptr. 234, 481 P.2d 242], citing the Universal Declaration of Human Rights; Newman, Natural Justice, Due Process and the New International Covenants on Human Rights: Prospectus, 1967 Pub. L. 274, 279-280; Freund, Bakke: The Choices That Remain, N. Y. Times (July 9, 1978) p. E17, col. 4, citing the United Nations treaty on elimination of all forms of racial discrimination.)
In Hawkins, supra, counsel did not consider that American Civil Liberties Union suggestion. Thus it was not discussed in the opinions filed therein.
Appellant‘s petition for a rehearing was denied December 13, 1978. Bird, C. J., Clark, J., and Richardson, J., were of the opinion that the petition should be granted.