People v. Harris

10 Cal. App. 4th 672, 12 Cal. Rptr. 2d 758, 92 Cal. Daily Op. Serv. 8712, 92 Daily Journal DAR 14407, 1992 Cal. App. LEXIS 1245
California Court of Appeal·Decided October 21, 1992·No. E009237·Published·Cited by 28 cases

Opinion

Opinion

TIMLIN, J.

Defendant appeals from the judgment entered upon his conviction by jury of one count of first degree burglary (Pen. Code, §§ 459/460), two counts of unlawful taking of a vehicle (Veh. Code, § 10851, subd. (a)) and one count of receiving stolen property (Pen. Code, § 496). 1

On appeal, defendant has raised the following contentions: (1) The trial court committed “per se” reversible error by conducting a portion of the voir dire proceedings in its chambers and outside the presence of the public, thus *675 violating defendant’s constitutional right to a public trial; (2) there was insufficient evidence to support his conviction for receiving stolen property; (3) there was insufficient evidence to support his conviction on one of the counts of unlawful taking of a vehicle; (4) the trial court committed reversible instructional error by giving the “flight” instruction; (5) the trial court violated section 654 in sentencing defendant; and (6) the trial court improperly relied on several sentencing factors in imposing consecutive sentences on defendant. We shall conclude that defendant’s first contention is meritorious and, consequently, that the judgment entered below must be reversed. 2 Given our conclusion as to defendant’s first contention, there is no need to address defendant’s other contentions on appeal. 3

*676 Facts

Given the singular ground upon which we have determined to reverse the judgment entered below, there is no need for a lengthy and seamless rendition of the facts underlying the charges brought against defendant. It suffices to note that defendant, together with a female companion (Portillo), was charged with various counts of burglary and unlawfully taking a vehicle—which counts referred to events occurring on two distinctly different occasions. Defendant pled not guilty to all counts.

Jury trial as to both defendant and codefendant Portillo thereafter commenced. At the very beginning of the jury selection proceedings, and outside the presence of the venirepersons, the trial judge proposed a particular procedure for selecting the jury—which procedure was new to counsel and is best explained by simply setting forth the following somewhat condensed and edited version of exchanges which took place between the trial judge and counsel:

“The Court: Back on the record. My proposal is, counsel, that I’ll voir dire on all—in all areas and I’ll receive, as I have Mrs. McGuire’s [Portillo’s counsel], all your concerns and questions you wish to ask I’ll address to the jury for you. I will also give you each ten minutes with the .panel beyond my extensive voir dire.

“Mr. Levine [counsel for defendant]: And by ‘the panel,’ the Court means the—

“The Court. The first 20, right.

“Mr. Levine: I didn’t count. There’s gonna be 20 people sitting up there?

“The Court: A total of 20, right.

“Mr. Levine: So we would have ten minutes each, for a total of 30 minutes, since there’s three counsel?

“The Court: Right.

“Mr. Levine: To question the first 20 people?

*677 “Mr. Levine: And then if we have preempts [sic] or for cause, what about the individual jurors that come up there?

“The Court: We’ll do a chambers striking, as I suggested to you, and then if we have to have additional jurors beyond that, we’ll discuss how much time is appropriate.

“Mr. Harrison [prosecutor]: The chambers striking, I’m uncertain what the Court intends on that.

“Mr. Levine: Are we going to wait until all of them are questioned? “The Court: All questioned and all the for cause [challenges] passed.

“Mr. Levine: Then we’ll go inside and exercise peremptories back and forth with the people seated?

“The Court: Filling the chairs of those— “Mr. Levine: On this side of the box?

“The Court: If you exercise a perempt on chair one, we’ll fill it with— “Mr. Levine: Chair 14?

“The Court: Shall we have two alternates in this case? I think one will be enough. So we’ll fill it with chair 14, right. And then so we’ll have a jury of 13 eventually impaneled, but we’ll fill chair one with chair 13 [sfc], then we’ll go on the [s/c] to the other side and then we’ll fill—

“Mr. Harrison: You just go through the in-chambers striking, peremptory striking, one time, and subsequent excusáis—

“The Court: My hope is that we’ll have a jury as a result of that. If we don’t, we’ll do that striking, then fill the additional chairs, those seven chairs with an additional seven and qualify them and then go through a similar striking process.

“Mr. Harrison: Out of the presence of the jury? “The Court: Right.

“Mr. Harrison: I’m not sure if I want to do it that way.

“The Court: Well, I do. And then I’ll come out and announce who’s to leave the box and who’s to replace who.

*678 “Mr. Harrison: I think we have the right to do our jury selection in the open court room in front of the jury. I understand the desire of moving it along speedily and that sort of thing, but at the same time, I think the panel has a right to know who’s excused by whom.

“The Court: Well, we’ll do it my way, counsel. Thank you.

“Mr. Harrison: I want to make a record on the jury selection process, specifically on 13259 of the pamphlet given to the Court, the second column, the fourth paragraph, ‘while concluding.’

“The Court: That’s interesting and it’s informative. I’ll be happy to select 12 and not 13.

“The Court: It admonishes us to consider a jury of 12 as opposed to 14, . . .

“Mr. Harrison: There’s one other issue that needs to be addressed.

“Mr. Harrison: In addition, the peremptory challenge outside the jury, let me cite to the Court the Press Enterprise Company versus Superior Court, a 1984 case, U.S. Supreme Court, 464 U.S. 501 [78 L.Ed.2d 629, 104 S.Ct. 819], for the proposition that the voir dire process is a public process. The public has right to be here. The People and the defense and the public have a right to a public trial, and the exercise of peremptory challenges in chambers, sequestered away from the public area, the jury itself, violates that public process.

“Mr. Levine: I think the public just spoke and told us that voir dire is something the public doesn’t want.

Free access — add to your briefcase to read the full text and ask questions with AI

People v. Harris, 10 Cal. App. 4th 672, 12 Cal. Rptr. 2d 758, 92 Cal. Daily Op. Serv. 8712, 92 Daily Journal DAR 14407, 1992 Cal. App. LEXIS 1245 (Cal. Ct. App. 1992).

10 Cal. App. 4th 672 (People v. Harris) — published by Counsel Stack Legal Research, free access to 12M+ legal documents.

Related

Agustin v. Golden Empire Transit Dist.
California Court of Appeal, 2025
Shanley v. Tracy Logistics LLC
E.D. California, 2025
State v. Coons
2023 ND 115 (North Dakota Supreme Court, 2023)
McNenny v. City of Los Angeles CA2/1
California Court of Appeal, 2022
State v. Morales
2019 ND 206 (North Dakota Supreme Court, 2019)
Upshaw v. Superior Court
California Court of Appeal, 2018
Upshaw v. Superior Court of Alameda Cnty.
231 Cal. Rptr. 3d 505 (California Court of Appeals, 5th District, 2018)
Alvarado v. Dart Container Corp. of Cal.
197 Cal. Rptr. 3d 304 (California Court of Appeals, 4th District, 2016)
Alvarado v. Dart Container Corp.
California Court of Appeal, 2016
Morris Publishing Group, LLC v. State
136 So. 3d 770 (District Court of Appeal of Florida, 2014)
Robert M. v. Superior Court CA5
California Court of Appeal, 2013
California Redevelopment Ass'n v. Matosantos
212 Cal. App. 4th 1457 (California Court of Appeal, 2013)
Steadman v. State
360 S.W.3d 499 (Court of Criminal Appeals of Texas, 2012)
Steadman, Jeffrey Dee
Court of Criminal Appeals of Texas, 2012
State v. Sadler
193 P.3d 1108 (Court of Appeals of Washington, 2008)
McDaniel v. McDaniel
161 Cal. App. 4th 458 (California Court of Appeal, 2008)
Owens v. United States
483 F.3d 48 (First Circuit, 2007)
People v. Willis
43 P.3d 130 (California Supreme Court, 2002)
People v. Willis
104 Cal. Rptr. 2d 450 (California Court of Appeal, 2001)