THE PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. STARLETTA PARTEE, Defendant and Appellant.
S248520
IN THE SUPREME COURT OF CALIFORNIA
January 23, 2020
Second Appellate District, Division Five B276040; Los Angeles County Superior Court TA138027
Justice Liu authored the opinion of the Court, in which Chief Justice Cantil-Sakauye and Justices Chin, Corrigan, Cuellar, Kruger, and Groban concurred.
PEOPLE v. PARTEE
S248520
Opinion of the Court by
After voluntarily speaking with law enforcement in the course of a murder investigation, defendant Starletta Partee declined to testify against four suspects in the ensuing prosecution, notwithstanding the compulsion of a subpoena and a grant of use immunity. The district attorney then prosecuted Partee for her failure to testify. A jury convicted Partee of four felony counts of accessory after the fact to murder under
Partee argues that her failure to testify does not support an accessory conviction because her silence does not fulfill the “overt or affirmative assistance” requirement of the crime of accessory. We agree. Because Partee‘s convictions for accessory were predicated on her failure to testify, we reverse the judgment of the Court of Appeal as to those convictions.
I.
On August 31, 2006, when Partee was 21 years old, she reported a rental car stolen. The rental company directed her to file a claim with the Hawthorne Police Department. Partee did so. When she arrived at the Hawthorne police station, detectives from the Los Angeles Police Department met her and drove her to the office of homicide detective John Skaggs. The Los Angeles police had found the car abandoned in a housing complex, with bullet indents in the body and a bullet casing caught between the hood and windshield. The police believed the vehicle was connected to a murder that occurred the night before.
Detective Skaggs conducted an interview with Partee, which he surreptitiously recorded. In the course of the interview, he told Partee, “[Y]ou‘re obligated to be completely truthful, even if it hurts. . . . If you‘re caught lying in some way, I would associate you directly with the murder. . . . If you lie to me, this much, I will associate you to the commission of that crime, okay.” He also said, “What is said in he[re] is between you and I. . . . Let‘s get that straight now.” At the close of the interview, Detective Skaggs stated, “You said, ‘All this was off the record.’ Okay. And I told you, ‘Yes.’ My question is, and it‘s not going to happen, but if the District Attorney or somebody said, ‘I need you to come and tell your story to court,’ how would you feel?” Partee replied that she would not testify because “that‘s my family, you help them.” She added that although she would not think that her family posed a threat or danger if she were to testify, she would be “uncomfortable” because she lived in a neighborhood with a strong gang presence.
Partee‘s statements to Detective Skaggs implicated her brother Nehemiah Robinson, her cousin Toyrion Green, and her friends Bryant and Byron Clark in the murder. Partee told Detective Skaggs that Robinson had borrowed the rental car the night before. Robinson had told her that he wanted the car to go see his girlfriend. At midnight, Robinson called Partee and said he was going to park the car elsewhere before returning home because he did not want their
Despite Detective Skaggs‘s representation to Partee that “it‘s not going to happen,” the district attorney did in fact subpoena Partee to testify against Robinson, Green, and the Clarks after they were charged with murder. But Partee did not appear at their 2008 trial. After Partee could not be found, the charges against the four were dismissed. In April 2015, law enforcement located Partee. She was subpoenaed and held in custody as a material witness. The district attorney reinitiated prosecution of the murder case, and at the June 2015 preliminary hearing in the revived case, the prosecutor informed the court that he intended to grant Partee use immunity. Partee‘s counsel told the court that he had told his client that the grant of immunity meant she could not rely on the Fifth Amendment to avoid testifying. Partee still declined to testify. She remained silent when the court tried to swear her in, and she did not answer the prosecutor‘s questions. The court held Partee in contempt, stating, “You are going to be put in custody with no bail until such time as you change your mind.” The murder charges were subsequently dismissed a second time. The court held Partee in custody as a material witness for seven and a half months.
The district attorney then charged Partee with four felony counts of accessory after the fact to murder and one misdemeanor count of contempt. To each count, the district attorney added a gang enhancement allegation pursuant to
At trial, Partee took the stand and explained her reasons for not testifying in the murder case. The year before, Partee had experienced retaliation for working with prosecutors as a witness after the murder of her boyfriend. Shortly after that murder, Partee‘s car was set on fire; when asked whether that was “a very traumatic experience,” Partee said, “Yes.” She was also shunned by members of her community and endured an attempted attack at a
In addition to fearing for her own and her daughter‘s safety, Partee said that she did not want to alienate her family, and she did not want the accused, who were family or like family to her, to go to prison for the rest of their lives due to her testimony. Relocation was not a viable option, Partee said, because she was caring for her deceased cousin‘s seven children and two of her deceased boyfriend‘s children. Moreover, relocation would require uprooting her daughter from her high school honors program. As Partee explained, “[I]t‘s impossible to escape your entire family to pick up and leave.”
The jury convicted Partee on the four felony counts of accessory after the fact to murder and one misdemeanor count of contempt, but found the gang allegations not true. The court suspended imposition of sentence on the condition that Partee serve 365 days in county jail, with credit for time served, and three years on probation. At sentencing, the trial court said, “[T]hroughout the trial, I think there was some sort of assertion that but for Ms. Partee, the four gentlemen who were accused of killing [the victim] might have been convicted. [¶] Now, I‘ve been in this particular business 45 years. . . . [I]t just seems to the court to assert that had it not been for Partee‘s testimony there would have been a conviction, seems to me to be conjecture, speculation and maybe guesswork.”
The Court of Appeal affirmed. (People v. Partee (2018) 21 Cal.App.5th 630 (Partee).) “[D]espite being held in custody as a material witness and offered immunity and relocation,” the court explained, “defendant‘s refusal to testify was motivated in part by the desire to ensure that her brother, cousin, and lifelong friends were not convicted and incarcerated. As a result, four accused murderers avoided trial and possible conviction. The prosecution, having tried in vain to compel defendant‘s testimony, and no doubt desiring to discourage similar behavior by other witnesses, particularly in gang-related cases, resorted to the present prosecution. We find no legal authority precluding it.” (Id. at p. 638.) The court went on to say, “Defendant did much more than simply commit contempt by refusing to testify. The jury found she refused to testify with the specific intent to help four accused murderers avoid trial, conviction, and punishment. The intent with which defendant acted distinguishes her level of culpability from that of a simple contempt.” (Ibid.) While acknowledging that accessory liability requires conduct amounting to “’ “overt or affirmative assistance to a known
Justice Baker dissented from this holding. (Partee, supra, 21 Cal.App.5th at p. 642 (conc. & dis. opn. of Baker, J.).) He observed that “[n]o California case has ever sanctioned use of
We granted review.
II.
Refusing to testify in the face of a subpoena, absent a valid reason, is a misdemeanor offense under the statute punishing contempt of court. (
In interpreting the terms “harbors, conceals or aids” in
We begin with the text, “giving it a plain and commonsense meaning . . . . in the context of the statutory framework as a whole.” (Coalition of Concerned Communities, Inc. v. City of Los Angeles (2004) 34 Cal.4th 733, 737.) The word “aids,” in isolation, could be read to cover not only overt action that provides assistance to a principal, but also passive conduct. When the word “aid” was added to
But
In 1872, these two provisions were enacted as part of the Penal Code in the same title, which defines penalties for various “[p]arties to [c]rime.” (1872 Pen. Code, § 32.) In 1935, the Legislature further aligned sections 31 and 32 by amending section 32 to its current form, adding the term “aids” alongside the terms “harbors” and “conceals.” (Stats. 1935, ch. 436, § 1, p. 1484.) Thus, “[s]ection 31 and section 32 are interrelated in that they are both constituent elements of a single legislative scheme — that portion of the Penal Code which defines the status of various parties to crime (tit. 2, pt. 1, of the Pen. Code, ‘Parties to Crime‘).” (People v. Elliott (1993) 14 Cal.App.4th 1633, 1641, fn. 7 (Elliott).)
“One of the fundamental rules of statutory construction is that interrelated statutory provisions should be harmonized and that, to that end, the same word or phrase should be given the same meaning within the interrelated provisions of the law.” (Elliott, supra, 14 Cal.App.4th at p. 1641, fn. 7.) With respect to
The word “aids” in
Paradigmatic examples of such assistance include disposing of a vehicle that the principal used in committing murder (People v. Linville (2018) 27 Cal.App.5th 919, 922) and driving the principal away from the scene of an attempted murder, suggesting that the principal conceal the gun used in the crime, and driving the principal to the site where the principal and the defendant concealed the gun, “any of which alone might constitute the actus reus of” accessory (People v. Gunn (1987) 197 Cal.App.3d 408, 415). On the other hand, evidence that a defendant “encouraged [the principal] to run away and that he, thereafter, hid with her” has been held insufficient for an accessory conviction. (Elliott, supra, 14 Cal.App.4th at p. 1642; see id. at p. 1642, fn. 9 [“the activities of the accused . . . must amount to overt assistance as opposed to mere incitement or encouragement“]). These cases have understood the word “aid” to mean ” ‘to assist, “to supplement the efforts of another.” ’ ” (People v. Bond (1910) 13 Cal.App. 175, 185; accord, People v. Thurman (1923) 62 Cal.App. 147, 152 (Thurman) [the word “aid” means “a contribution of effort supplementing the efforts of another“].)
The question in this case concerns a witness‘s silence in the face of legal compulsion to provide testimony in a criminal trial. It is not obvious that such silence — a failure to supplement the efforts of the prosecution — amounts to ” ‘overt or affirmative assistance.’ ” (Nuckles, supra, 56 Cal.4th at p. 610.) An examination of case law concerning witness statements as a basis for accessory liability casts significant doubt on the statute‘s applicability here.
The Court of Appeal discussed three cases — Duty, supra, 269 Cal.App.2d 97, In re I.M. (2005) 125 Cal.App.4th 1195 (I.M.), and People v. Plengsangtip (2007) 148 Cal.App.4th 825 (Plengsangtip) — that, in its view, involved “similar circumstances” and supply “precedent for an accessory conviction under the facts of this case.” (Partee, supra, 21 Cal.App.5th at p. 636.) These cases are not binding on us and, in any event, do not support an accessory conviction based on Partee‘s conduct. In fact, the case law is consistent that a refusal to give
In Duty, supra, 269 Cal.App.2d 97, the defendant gave an “inferably false statement” to a city fire marshal investigating an arson: He stated that the principal‘s car had been in a particular location at the time of the crime, but the prosecution‘s evidence indicated otherwise. (Id. at p. 103.) Upholding a
I.M., supra, 125 Cal.App.4th 1195, similarly involved a defendant who made a misleading statement to authorities investigating a murder. The court cited Duty for the proposition that “[a] person may aid, or attempt to aid, the principal to a crime by making false or misleading statements to the authorities, and such conduct will support a conviction of accessory after the fact.” (I.M., at p. 1203, citing Duty, supra, 269 Cal.App.2d at p. 104.) The I.M. court upheld an accessory conviction based on evidence that the defendant “was attempting to protect Victor [the principal] by misrepresenting to the police that Victor began to shoot only after” a friend of the murder victim had acted in a threatening manner, including by “reach[ing] towards his waistband” for a possible weapon. (I.M., at p. 1203; see id. at p. 1201 [“The physical evidence was inconsistent with the statements by defendant . . . .“]). The defendant‘s misrepresentation “could be viewed as an attempt to show that Victor shot under heat of passion, or that Victor thought he was acting in self-defense,” thereby aiding Victor in avoiding punishment. (Id. at p. 1205.)
Plengsangtip, supra, 148 Cal.App.4th 825, is also similar. The court there upheld a conviction under
Thus, neither Duty, I.M., nor Plengsangtip provides “precedent for an accessory conviction under the facts of this case.” (Partee, supra, 21 Cal.App.5th at p. 636.) All three cases upheld accessory convictions on the basis of affirmative and misleading statements made to investigating authorities, whereas Partee‘s accessory conviction was based on her refusal to make any statement at all during the June 2015 preliminary hearing. We do not decide whether an affirmative misstatement is sufficient to form the basis of an accessory charge. But we agree that “the mere passive failure to reveal a crime, the refusal to give information, or the denial of knowledge motivated by self-interest does not constitute the crime of accessory.” (Plengsangtip, supra, 148 Cal.App.4th at p. 836.)
Other cases are in accord. (See Shortridge v. Municipal Court (1984) 151 Cal.App.3d 611, 620 & fn. 10 (Shortridge) [a construction of
The dissenting justice in the Court of Appeal below found “no court in any jurisdiction nationwide that has ever sanctioned this sort of an accessory after the fact prosecution.” (Partee, supra, 21 Cal.App.5th at p. 642 (conc. & dis. opn. of Baker, J.).) Our own research has likewise found no case on point. The Attorney General acknowledges “[t]he absence of specific precedent on this issue” but offers two theories as to why Partee‘s conduct constitutes overt or affirmative assistance under
First, like the Court of Appeal, the Attorney General underscores that Partee‘s conduct was not “a mere failure to report a crime to authorities” but rather a “refus[al] to testify in the face of a legal duty.” It is true that the cases above do not address scenarios involving a valid subpoena. And the subpoena here along with the grant of use immunity distinguishes this case from Nguyen, where two defendants who refused to talk to the police had no legal duty to do so. (See Nguyen, supra, 21 Cal.App.4th at p. 539 [“Obviously the exercise of the constitutional right to remain silent cannot be the basis for conviction as an accessory.“].)
But the Attorney General does not explain how a legal duty to testify transforms Partee‘s silence from “merely passive” conduct to “overt or affirmative assistance” under
Further, we note that the law offers protections for certain crime victims that prohibit them from being held in custody for contempt for refusing to testify, but there is no similar exception for an accessory after the fact. (See Code Civ. Proc., § 1219, subd. (b) [“a court shall not imprison or otherwise confine or place in custody the victim of a sexual assault or domestic violence crime for contempt if the contempt consists of refusing to testify concerning that sexual assault or domestic violence crime“].) It would be quite odd if a victim of sexual assault or domestic violence could not be held in custody for contempt for refusing to testify, but could be prosecuted under the same circumstances as an accessory after the fact.
Second, the Attorney General contends that unlike witnesses who “refuse to testify or feign ignorance based on fears of retribution,” a recalcitrant witness who disobeys a court order with the intent to help another evade prosecution has rendered overt or affirmative assistance within the ambit of
CONCLUSION
We hold that a witness‘s refusal to testify in the face of a valid subpoena, while punishable as contempt, does not by itself amount to harboring, concealing, or aiding a principal within the meaning of
The crime of contempt is the vehicle that the Legislature has provided ” ‘to enable the courts to vindicate their authority and maintain the dignity and respect due to them’ ” when confronted with a recalcitrant witness. (In re McKinney, supra, 70 Cal.2d at p. 12.) Misdemeanor contempt is punishable by one year in jail and a $1,000 fine. (
We reverse the judgment of the Court of Appeal with respect to Partee‘s four convictions under
LIU, J.
We Concur:
CANTIL-SAKAUYE, C. J.
CHIN, J.
CORRIGAN, J.
CUÉLLAR, J.
KRUGER, J.
GROBAN, J.
See next page for addresses and telephone numbers for counsel who argued in Supreme Court.
Name of Opinion People v. Partee
Unpublished Opinion
Original Appeal
Original Proceeding
Review Granted XXX 21 Cal.App.5th 630
Rehearing Granted
Opinion No. S248520
Date Filed: January 23, 2020
Court: Superior
County: Los Angeles
Judge: Allen J. Webster, Jr.
Counsel:
Paul Kleven, under appointment by the Supreme Court, for Defendant and Appellant.
Xavier Becerra, Attorney General, Gerald A. Engler, Chief Assistant Attorney General, Lance E. Winters, Assistant Attorney General, Louis W. Karlin, Scott A. Taryle, Stacy S. Schwartz, Colleen M. Tiedemann and Ilana Herscovitz Reid, Deputy Attorneys General, for Plaintiff and Respondent.
Jackie Lacey, District Attorney (Los Angeles), Phyllis C. Asayama and Kenneth Von Helmolt, Deputy District Attorneys, for Los Angeles County District Attorney as Amicus Curiae on behalf of Plaintiff and Respondent.
Counsel who argued in Supreme Court (not intended for publication with opinion):
Paul Kleven
Law Office of Paul Kleven
1604 Solano Avenue
Berkeley, CA 94707
(510) 528-7347
Colleen M. Tiedemann
Deputy Attorney General
300 South Spring Street, Suite 1702
Los Angeles, CA 90013
(213) 269-6599