People v. Bell CA4/1

California Court of Appeal·Decided May 13, 2021·No. D076805·Unpublished

Opinion

Filed 5/13/21 P. v. Bell CA4/1 NOT TO BE PUBLISHED IN OFFICIAL REPORTS California Rules of Court, rule 8.1115(a), prohibits courts and parties from citing or relying on opinions not certified for publication or ordered published, except as specified by rule 8.1115(b). This opinion has not been certified for publication or ordered published for purposes of rule 8.1115.

COURT OF APPEAL, FOURTH APPELLATE DISTRICT

DIVISION ONE

STATE OF CALIFORNIA

THE PEOPLE, D076805

Plaintiff and Respondent,

v. (Super. Ct. No. SCD282653)

MICHAEL BELL,

Defendant and Appellant.

APPEAL from a judgment of the Superior Court of San Diego County, Runston G. Maino, Judge. Affirmed in part, reversed in part, and remanded for resentencing. Erica Gambale, under appointment by the Court of Appeal, for Defendant and Appellant. Xavier Becerra, Attorney General, Lance E. Winters, Chief Assistant Attorney General, Julie L. Garland, Assistant Attorney General, Arlene A. Sevidal, Collette C. Cavalier and James M. Toohey, Deputy Attorneys General, for Plaintiff and Respondent. I. INTRODUCTION Defendant Michael Bell appeals from a judgment of conviction after a jury found him guilty of one count of escape while confined for a felony (Pen. Code, §4532, subd. (b)(1)). The trial court sentenced Bell to probation for a separate crime, and, as part of his probation, Bell was to serve 240 days in custody at a reentry facility and participate in a work furlough program. The same day that Bell arrived at the reentry facility where he was to complete the work furlough portion of his sentence, he was granted permission to leave to go to the hospital for medical treatment. Bell did not return, and after three days of being absent from the facility, he was discovered at a port of entry attempting to re-enter the United States from Mexico. Bell was charged with and tried on one count of escape while confined for a felony. Bell asserts that the trial court erred in instructing the jury with respect to the offense. Bell contends that even though the offense of escape while confined for a felony is a general intent crime, a defendant must have actually known of the requirement that he return to the place of confinement and have intentionally failed to return, in order to be convicted of the offense. Bell contends that the trial court should have instructed the jury with respect to this knowledge requirement by giving three related instructions that the defense requested. Specifically, Bell argues that the trial court should have instructed the jury with a modified version of CALCRIM No. 2760, which is the instruction regarding the substantive elements of the offense of escape while confined for a felony, so that it would have included as an element of the offense that the People had to prove that the defendant had actual knowledge that he was required to return to the place of confinement. Bell also argues that the trial court should have given CALCRIM No. 225, which

2 describes the use of circumstantial evidence to establish intent or mental state, rather than CALCRIM No. 224, regarding the use of circumstantial evidence generally, and that the court also should have given CALCRIM No. 251, which addresses the specific intent or mental state necessary to commit the charged offense, rather than CALCRIM No. 250, the general intent instruction. Even if we presume that Bell is correct in his assertion that the trial court’s instructions were erroneous and that the court should have instructed the jury that Bell had to have actually known that he was required to return to the reentry facility, such presumed error was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt given the evidence presented at trial. After briefing on Bell’s appeal was complete, we granted Bell leave to file a supplemental brief in which he argued that he is entitled to the ameliorative effect of an amendment to Penal Code section 1203.1, subdivision (a), which became effective January 1, 2021. Specifically, Bell contends that he is entitled to seek a reduction of his three-year probation term under recently enacted Assembly Bill No. 1950 (Stats. 2020, ch. 328, § 2). Effective January 1, 2021, Assembly Bill No. 1950 amended section 1203.1 to limit the maximum probation term that a trial court is authorized to impose for most felony offenses to two years. Bell asserts that Assembly Bill No. 1950's limitation on the maximum duration of felony probation constitutes an ameliorative change to the criminal law that applies retroactively to cases that were not reduced to final judgment as of the effective date of the new law. We agree. We therefore affirm the judgment with respect to Bell’s conviction. However, we reverse the probation order and remand the matter for the trial

3 court to enter a new probation order consistent with Assembly Bill No. 1950 and this opinion. II. FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND A. Factual background Bell was convicted of a felony, granted formal probation, and ordered to serve 240 days of custody in a “reentry facility” for a “work furlough program.” After law enforcement officers transported Bell from jail to the facility, program staff assigned him a room and a bed, and issued him an identification badge. Bell signed a check-in sheet and indicated the date and time that he arrived at the facility. Later that evening, Bell requested that an ambulance be summoned to transport him to the hospital due to a medical issue, and an ambulance was called. Bell was granted the usual four hours for his medical visit. A staff member at the reentry facility advised Bell of the rules regarding his hospital visit, which included requirements that he call the facility when he arrived at the hospital, that he call the facility each hour, and that he return with the discharge paperwork from the hospital. Before Bell left the facility, Bell signed his check-out sheet, which indicated where he was going and also indicated that he was expected to return by 4:00 a.m. Staff also verbally informed Bell that he was expected to return by 4:00 a.m., and told him that he could be granted an extension of time if he requested one. Bell did not call when he arrived at the hospital. At 7:00 a.m. the following day, when Bell had not yet returned, a supervisor at the reentry facility began to investigate Bell’s whereabouts. She learned that he had been admitted to the hospital at 11:48 p.m. the previous night, and that he had been discharged from the hospital a few hours later, at 2:52 a.m. The

4 supervisor searched for the bus routes from the hospital to the facility and determined that Bell should have arrived back at the facility at around

7:00 a.m.1 The supervisor waited until approximately 8:45 or 9:00 a.m. to “deem it an escape,” at which point she called the San Diego Police to report that Bell had escaped from the facility. On July 29, 2019, three days after he left the reentry facility to receive medical treatment, Bell presented himself at the San Ysidro port of entry attempting to gain entry into the United States. Bell possessed no identification documents, but he provided his name and date of birth to the border patrol agent. An agent looked up Bell’s information on the computer and another took his fingerprints; the agents discovered that Bell had an outstanding warrant and sent him to secondary inspection. B. Procedural background In August 2019, the People charged Bell with one count of escape while confined for a felony (Pen. Code, § 4532, subd. (b)(1)). Bell was tried, and a jury found him guilty of the charged offense. On November 6, 2019, the trial court sentenced Bell to three years of formal probation. Bell filed a timely notice of appeal. III. DISCUSSION A. Bell has not demonstrated reversible error with respect to his conviction Bell contends that the trial court committed three related instructional errors.

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