Mancinas v. Covello

CourtDistrict Court, N.D. California
DecidedJanuary 3, 2020
Docket4:18-cv-06235
StatusUnknown

This text of Mancinas v. Covello (Mancinas v. Covello) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, N.D. California primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Mancinas v. Covello, (N.D. Cal. 2020).

Opinion

1 UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 2 NORTHERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA 3 4 CHRISTOPHER MANCINAS, Case No. 18-cv-06235-YGR (PR)

5 Petitioner, ORDER DENYING PETITION FOR WRIT OF HABEAS CORPUS; AND 6 v. DENYING CERTIFICATE OF APPEALABILITY 7 MARCUS POLLARD, Acting Warden,1 8 Respondent.

9 I. INTRODUCTION 10 Petitioner Christopher Mancinas, a state prisoner, is currently incarcerated at the Richard J. 11 Donovan Correctional Facility, pursuant to his judgments in three cases, People v. Christopher 12 Mancinas, Sonoma County Superior Court Case Nos. SCR498868, SCR590577, and SCR595589. 13 On April 16, 2012, in Case No. SCR595589, a Sonoma County jury convicted Petitioner of active 14 participation in a criminal street gang (count four), which was in connection with the gang-related 15 death of a non-gang member named Dewey Tucker,2 with one strike prior conviction, one prior 16 serious felony conviction, and two prior prison terms. See People v. Mancinas, No. A141759, 17 2017 WL 1422589, at *1-2 (Cal. Ct. App. Apr. 21, 2017, as modified on denial of reh’g, May 16, 18 2017). Meanwhile, on September 13, 2013, in Case No. SCR590577, Petitioner pleaded no 19 contest to possession of methamphetamine for sale, transportation of methamphetamine, 20 possession of cocaine, and possession of a firearm by a felon, with one strike prior conviction and 21 prior prison term. See id. at *1. Lastly, on December 4, 2013, in Case No. SCR498868, Petitioner 22 pleaded no contest to assault with a deadly weapon and admitted one strike prior conviction. See 23 id. On April 9, 2014, the trial court sentenced Petitioner to an aggregate twenty-two years in 24

25 1 Marcus Pollard, the current acting warden of the prison where Petitioner is incarcerated, has been substituted as Respondent pursuant to Rule 25(d) of the Federal Rules of Civil 26 Procedure.

27 2 In Case No. SCR595589, the jury acquitted Petitioner on the remaining three counts, 1 prison for the three aforementioned cases.3 Id. at 2. 2 Petitioner brings the instant pro se habeas action under 28 U.S.C. § 2254 to challenge his 3 conviction for actively participating in a criminal street gang in connection with Tucker’s murder 4 in Case No. SCR595589. Dkt. 1. 5 Having read and considered the papers filed in connection with this matter and being fully 6 informed, the Court hereby DENIES the petition for the reasons set forth below. 7 II. FACTUAL BACKGROUND 8 The California Court of Appeal issued a published opinion, upholding in part and reversing 9 in part the convictions of Petitioner’s co-defendant, Raul Vega,4 who was tried separately, in 10 which it described in detail the facts concerning Tucker’s murder on January 12, 2010. See People 11 v. Vega, 236 Cal. App. 4th 484, 487-89 (2015). Therefore, the Court of Appeal did not provide a 12 more detailed recitation of the murder in its unpublished opinion affirming Petitioner’s conviction 13 and, instead, summarized the facts of Petitioner’s offenses in limited context, as follows.5 14 No. SCR595589 involves the murder of Tucker, which was described 15 in detail in a published opinion from this court, where we upheld in part and reversed in part the convictions of Raul Vega, a co-defendant 16 of [Petitioner] who was tried separately. (See People v. Vega (2015) 236 Cal. App. 4th 484, 487-489 (Vega).)[FN5] We need not give a 17 more detailed recitation of the murder here. Of course, for purposes of this appeal, we rely exclusively on the evidence presented at 18 [Petitioner]’s trial, which differed significantly from the evidence presented at Vega’s trial. We therefore will discuss: (1) the evidence 19 presented by the district attorney in this case that we find to be sufficient to support [Petitioner]’s conviction under section 186.22, 20 subdivision (a), and (2) the evidence [Petitioner] presented in his defense. Before doing so, we note three uncontroverted facts. First, 21

22 3 In Case No. SCR595589, Petitioner was sentenced to a term of seven years and four 23 months, consecutive to his other cases, Case Nos. SCR498868 and SCR590577. Resp’t Ex. A, CT 590-591. 24 4 Vega filed a separate federal habeas action, Case No. C 16-05145 YGR (PR), which the 25 Court denied on the merits and issued judgment. See Dkts. 16, 17 in Case No. C 16-05145 YGR (PR) (N.D. Cal. Oct. 24, 2017). Thereafter, the Ninth Circuit denied a certificate of appealability. 26 See Dkt. 22 in Case No. C 16-05145 YGR (PR).

27 5 This summary is presumed correct. See Hernandez v. Small, 282 F.3d 1132, 1135 n.1 (9th Cir. 2002); 28 U.S.C. § 2254(e)(1). 1 there are two rival factions of the Sureños (a street gang controlled by the Mexican Mafia) in Santa Rosa, known as Varrio Sureño Loco 2 (VSL) and Angelino Heights (AH). Second, [Petitioner] was a well- respected and active high-ranking member of the Sureños gang at the 3 time of Tucker’s murder, and although he claimed not to be a member of either AH or VSL, he had influence with both. And third, 4 [Petitioner] was an FBI informant for about two years until June 2010, although [Petitioner] was not informed of his termination as an 5 informant until October of that year.

6 [FN 5:] We cite Vega in lieu of a detailed recitation of background facts regarding the two rival subsets of the Sureños in Santa Rosa, the 7 inter-gang hostilities that led up to Tucker’s murder, the letter received by the police on January 12, 2010, identification of the 8 participants in Tucker’s murder, the location of the murder, and the manner in which he was killed. We do not rely upon it as evidence 9 of [Petitioner]’s role in the events.

10 1. The District Attorney’s Case

11 In early 2010, both gangs and the police were aware some feud or war was mounting between AH and VSL. For instance, on January 12, 12 2010, the police came into possession of a letter written by an imprisoned VSL member calling for the assassination of three senior 13 members of AH, as well as [Petitioner]. This letter appeared to set the rest of the events into motion. 14 Based on circumstantial evidence and impeachment of [Petitioner]’s 15 self-serving testimony, the district attorney argued [Petitioner] drove to Vallejo on January 12 with other AH members to have Vega kill 16 Ramon Ochoa or Vicente Tapia, both high-ranking VSL members, in retaliation for the murder of Alejandro Ortega, a member of the AH 17 gang, a few weeks earlier. That evening, [Petitioner] borrowed his girlfriend Nicole Allen’s car; when he returned later that night, he told 18 her to not talk to the police about it. The AH gang members thought Ochoa would be at Vicente Tapia’s apartment complex on January 19 12. Once in Vallejo, [Petitioner] helped Vega and another AH member obtain a stolen vehicle to take to Tapia’s apartment complex. 20 Vega and his companion followed a white car leaving Tapia’s apartment complex, believing Ochoa was the driver; [Petitioner] 21 followed close behind. After following the white car onto the freeway, Vega ended up shooting Tucker, who was the actual driver 22 and is not affiliated with any gang. Among other evidence, the district attorney used [Petitioner]’s cell phone records and expert witness 23 testimony to place [Petitioner] at or near the scene of the crime.

24 For the next day or so following the murder, [Petitioner] spoke with another high-ranking Sureños member and close friend, Gerardo 25 Hernandez, over a dozen times. In May 2010, police recovered a handgun from Hernandez’s residence that was later believed to be the 26 weapon used in Tucker’s murder. The gun had been stolen from Arizona at or around a time when [Petitioner] and, later, Hernandez 27 lived there, although there was no direct evidence tying either to the 1 theft.

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Mancinas v. Covello, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/mancinas-v-covello-cand-2020.