People v. Alfieri

95 Cal. App. 3d 533, 157 Cal. Rptr. 304, 1979 Cal. App. LEXIS 1985
CourtCalifornia Court of Appeal
DecidedJuly 30, 1979
DocketCrim. 31063
StatusPublished
Cited by16 cases

This text of 95 Cal. App. 3d 533 (People v. Alfieri) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering California Court of Appeal primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
People v. Alfieri, 95 Cal. App. 3d 533, 157 Cal. Rptr. 304, 1979 Cal. App. LEXIS 1985 (Cal. Ct. App. 1979).

Opinions

Opinion

THOMPSON, J.

After a jury trial, 17-year-old Victor Arthur Alfieri, Jr., was convicted in the adult court of second degree murder and placed in the custody of the Youth Authority. In this appeal, he contends: (1) trial court action receiving in evidence his admissions and confession impels reversal because of application of an improper standard by the court in determining the facts preliminary to admissibility and because the record compels the conclusion they were unlawfully obtained; (2) the trial court erred in failing to impose an appropriate sanction for the prosecution’s destruction of tape recordings of telephone conversations; (3) the jury was erroneously instructed with respect to the manner of its consideration of the credibility of Alfieri’s testimony; and (4) the judgment fails to credit Alfieri with time served in custody in the period before judgment.

We conclude: (1) the trial court having determined the facts preliminaiy to the admissibility of Alfieri’s statements by application of the preponderance of the evidence standard, People v. Jimenez (1978) 21 Cal.3d 595 [147 Cal.Rptr. 172, 580 P.2d 672], decided by our Supreme Court after the trial at bar but expressly made applicable to cases pending on appeal, mandates reversal for failure of the trial court to apply the [537]*537reasonable doubt standard to its determination; (2) because the reversal of the judgment remands the matter to the trial court for a new trial, we need not decide whether on the record the statements must be held to be inadmissible as a matter of law; (3) the trial court also applied an improper standard in ruling upon the consequences of the prosecution’s destruction of the tape recordings but the error was harmless; (4) the propriety of the questioned jury instruction need not now be determined because the issue of its validity is presently before the Supreme Court; and (5) in the event Alfieri is convicted after retrial, he is entitled to credit against his sentence for prejudgment time in custody.

Facts of Murder

Alfieri’s sister was brutally murdered. Evidence, the most damning of which consists of Alfieri’s admissions and his confession while in police custody, establishes his guilt of the crime. The detail of the admissions and confession meshes closely with the facts established by physical evidence and other testimony.

Facts With Respect to Interrogation and Destruction of Tape Recordings

The testimony regarding the interrogation of Alfieri was first developed in two separate pretrial hearings, one on a motion to suppress his admissions and a confession made in the course of police questioning and then in a subsequent hearing on a motion to dismiss for the police destruction of tape recordings of conversations of deputy sheriffs with Alfieri’s family. Both motions were renewed at the commencement at trial and were there denied. Because the ruling of the trial judge on the motion to suppress is based upon the entire record of both pretrial hearings, we recite the evidence without segregating its manner of pretrial presentation.

The body of Laura Alfieri, defendant’s sister, was discovered on August 7, 1976. At 8:20 p.m. on August 22, San Luis Obispo deputy sheriffs met with Alfieri in his home where he lived with his parents. Based upon apparent discrepancies in information given by Alfieri to them concerning his whereabouts at the time Laura was murdered and statements of Alfieri’s father, the deputies determined to question Alfieri further. Alfieri was 17 years old when questioned. He was of borderline low intelligence and subsequently psychiatrically diagnosed as highly suggestible. Alfieri had only one prior contact with the police.

[538]*538At 9:30 p.m. on August 22, Alfieri voluntarily accompanied the deputy sheriffs to the San Luis Obispo station. Arriving at the station at 9:50, Alfieri was given a Miranda warning amplified by the statement that he had a right to the presence of his parents. He was interrogated until 4:30 a.m. on August 23. There were several short breaks in the course of the questioning. Alfieri denied connection with the murder. The deputies determined that he should be transported to his home with the thought that Alfieri would return the afternoon of the 23 d for a polygraph examination.

Early on the morning of August 23 before Alfieri was returned home, his father telephoned the sheriff’s station in San Luis Obispo. Pursuant to the regular practice of the sheriff’s department, a tape recording was made of the call. In the course of a telephone conversation with Deputy Sheriff Hastie, the senior Alfieri inquired concerning his son and was told his son was all right. According to the father’s unrebutted testimony, he also informed Hastie that Alfieri senior would arrange for an attorney for his son. Also according to the father’s unrebutted testimony, Hastie replied that an attorney should not be secured; that if Alfieri, Jr., were represented by coúnsel, the sheriff’s office would drop the investigation and Alfieri, senior, would never know what happened to his daughter. Hastie told the senior Alfieri that his son was being sent home and advised him that chances were his son might try to kill him and his wife so that the senior Alfieri should hide all weapons and knives as well as keys to his trucks.

Alfieri was transported to his home on the morning of August 23. He voluntarily returned to the sheriff’s station at 3 p.m. on that day to undergo the polygraph examination. A Miranda warning was repeated, and the examination commenced at 3:15 p.m. continuing until 6:20 p.m. Alfieri failed the polygraph test and was so advised. He responded that “the machine was wrong.”

Sheriff’s deputies resumed the questioning of Alfieri at 6:45 p.m., and continued until 8:30 when it was interrupted so that Alfieri might eat dinner. Alfieri continued to deny his guilt. Questioning resumed at 9:10 p.m. After a 20-minute break at 9:40, the questioning was again pursued in a new format. A deputy asked that Alfieri assume that he was two people, one who could not remember what had occurred and the other who had killed his sister. Alfieri was then instructed to relate what could have occurred if in fact he were the killer. Through that process over a period of one and one-half hours, Alfieri reconstructed the detail of how [539]*539the crime could have occurred. Near the end of the interview he said, “I probably did it,” and added that he had no memory of “it at certain points.” After that statement, Alfieri said he would like to go home. The questioning deputy responded: “You can’t. Can you ever go home and really feel everything is controllable, everything is?” Alfieri said, “I’d like to be with my parents though.” The interrogator continued the questioning in the hypothetical situation format. In the course of his interrogation, the deputy said to Alfieri: “It takes a bigger man than you believe to admit that something happened and to admit that help is needed and I respect you as a man for that. The hardest thing in the world is admitting that a mistake was made.” Alfieri responded, “I guess I did do it, you know, but I still don’t think I did. . .

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People v. Alfieri
95 Cal. App. 3d 533 (California Court of Appeal, 1979)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
95 Cal. App. 3d 533, 157 Cal. Rptr. 304, 1979 Cal. App. LEXIS 1985, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/people-v-alfieri-calctapp-1979.