People v. Hernandez CA3

CourtCalifornia Court of Appeal
DecidedMarch 8, 2016
DocketC068079A
StatusUnpublished

This text of People v. Hernandez CA3 (People v. Hernandez CA3) 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. Hernandez CA3, (Cal. Ct. App. 2016).

Opinion

Filed 3/8/16 P. v. Hernandez CA3 Opinion on transfer NOT TO BE PUBLISHED

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 This opinion has not been certified for publication or ordered published for purposes of rule 8.1115.

IN THE COURT OF APPEAL OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA THIRD APPELLATE DISTRICT (San Joaquin) ----

THE PEOPLE, C068079

Plaintiff and Respondent, (Super. Ct. Nos. SF113661C & SF113661A) v.

ARMONDO HERNANDEZ et al.,

Defendants and Appellants.

THE PEOPLE, C068517

Plaintiff and Respondent, (Super. Ct. No. SF113661B)

v. OPINION ON TRANSFER MARTIN FLORES,

Defendant and Appellant.

1 Defendants Armondo Hernandez, Roberto Arias, and Martin Flores participated in several crimes in Tracy, including the murder of Spencer Sampson and multiple assaults on others, in December 2009. The crimes were committed for the benefit of defendants’ criminal street gang. Sentenced to determinate and indeterminate terms in state prison, defendants appeal. On appeal, defendants, each represented separately, make numerous contentions of error in the trial court proceedings. Some contentions are unique to one defendant, but others are common to two or all three of the defendants. We indicate in the heading of each contention who is making the contention. We conclude that only one contention has merit. The trial court sentenced defendants Arias and Flores to determinate and indeterminate terms without indicating in its oral pronouncement of sentencing whether the indeterminate terms would be concurrent or consecutive. As a result, the indeterminate terms were concurrent by operation of law. The minute orders and abstracts of judgment, however, stated that the indeterminate terms were consecutive. We therefore affirm the judgments and direct the trial court to correct the clerical errors in the minute orders and abstracts of judgment. FACTS Defendants’ crimes occurred on two days, December 16 and 18, 2009.1 Four perpetrators were prosecuted, including the three defendants here. The fourth, Jose Hernandez, was a minor at the time of the crimes, and he was tried separately.2 Not every defendant participated in every crime, but all participated in some.

1 All dates in this opinion refer to 2009. 2 Jose Hernandez was convicted of attempted murder and other crimes and sentenced to a total term of 61 years to life. He has appealed the judgment. (C067260.) In this opinion we refer to Jose Hernandez by his full name and to Armondo Hernandez, who is one of the three defendants prosecuted together, as defendant Hernandez.

2 Defendants are members of the Proud Brown Trece subset of the Sureños criminal street gang, which is a rival of the Norteños criminal street gang. We do not relate here the specific facts supporting their designation as gang members, but we fully discuss those facts later in relation to their contentions concerning gang allegations and findings. Two juries heard the evidence in this proceeding – one jury as to defendant Flores and the other as to defendants Arias and Hernandez. Defendant Flores had a separate jury mainly because he gave a statement to police concerning the crimes and implicating his codefendants. While we refer to the statement of defendant Flores in this factual summary, that evidence was not presented against defendants Arias and Hernandez and is not being considered with respect to the contentions of defendants Arias and Hernandez. A. Assault on John Doe (count 12 as to defendant Flores only) The gang’s crime spree began on December 16, when defendant Flores and several associates saw a Norteño gang member, and some of defendant Flores’s group chased him. Someone in the group shot at the Norteño three to five times. In his statement, defendant Flores said that he joined defendant Arias, Jose Hernandez, and others whom he did not know or identify, in the search for a particular Norteño. They did not find that specific Norteño, but they found another. Although defendant Flores claimed he stayed in the truck, others got out and confronted the Norteño. They asked if he was a Norteño, and he confirmed it. They then chased the Norteño, and Jose Hernandez fired the shots, which probably did not hit the man. B. Assaults on Edward Rigor and Melanie Bartolomei (counts 1, 3 & 4 as to defendants Flores and Arias only) Also on the evening of December 16, defendants Flores and Arias, along with one other person, followed Edward Rigor and Melanie Bartolomei into an apartment complex. Either defendant Flores or defendant Arias challenged Rigor, who used to be a Norteño, to say, “[F]uck [N]orte,” which he refused to do. As Rigor and Bartolomei walked away, one of the defendants fired four or five rounds in the direction of Rigor and

3 Bartolomei. Two bullets struck Rigor, and one pierced his right lung. A bullet also went through an apartment window. Bartolomei identified defendant Arias as the gunman, but Rigor identified defendant Flores as the gunman. In defendant Flores’s statement to police, he claimed that he drove the group to the apartment complex but that he stayed in the truck and kept the engine running while the others went into the apartment complex to confront the man they suspected of being a Norteño. Defendant Flores heard one gunshot, and he drove away after the others got back in the truck. C. Assault on James Stancampiano (counts 5 & 6 as to defendant Flores only) Again on the evening of December 16, five or six shots were fired in the vicinity of a shopping center with a Supercuts hair salon. Norteño gang member James Stancampiano, panicked and shaky, ran into the Supercuts. He asked to use a telephone, and he called someone and pleaded for a ride from the person he called. He told the salon manager that someone was shooting at him. Three men appeared outside of Supercuts. Defendant Flores opened the door and told the people inside that they needed to get Stancampiano out of there because the police were after him. The salon manager told Stancampiano to leave. Stancampiano peeked out the door, and then ran away. In his statement to police, defendant Flores said that they saw a Norteño, so some of the others in the group got out of the truck and chased the Norteño while defendant Flores stayed in the truck. Someone shot at Stancampiano three or four times until he escaped into the shopping center. Defendant Flores parked the truck and helped search for Stancampiano. They found him at Supercuts, but defendant Flores claimed it was defendant Arias who opened the door and told the people inside to make Stancampiano leave. On December 18, defendant Flores had a text messaging conversation with someone in which he texted that (1) they were “going to shoot chapetas,” (2) on December 16 they had “shot three,” and (3) they had “hit the target.”

4 D. Assaults on David Zepeda and Angelo DeHaro (counts 7 & 8 as to all defendants) Between 9:00 and 9:30 p.m. on December 18, defendant Flores was stopped in his GMC Yukon by a Tracy police officer near the Bonfare Market. The officer impounded the Yukon because defendant Flores did not have a driver’s license. After his vehicle was impounded, defendant Flores communicated by text and phone calls with defendant Arias and went into the Bonfare Market. Security camera footage from the market showed that defendant Flores walked into the market as three people – Spencer Sampson and Robert Limon (both Norteños) and Stephanie Sampson – were leaving. Spencer Sampson and defendant Flores exchanged words, but Spencer Sampson and his group left the store. In his statement to police, defendant Flores said that he, defendant Arias, defendant Hernandez, and others met up and went looking for the Norteños who had insulted him at the market. Around 10:00 p.m.

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

Related

Miranda v. Arizona
384 U.S. 436 (Supreme Court, 1966)
United States v. Powell
469 U.S. 57 (Supreme Court, 1984)
Boyde v. California
494 U.S. 370 (Supreme Court, 1990)
Missouri v. Seibert
542 U.S. 600 (Supreme Court, 2004)
People v. Sauceda-Contreras
282 P.3d 279 (California Supreme Court, 2012)
People v. Houston
281 P.3d 799 (California Supreme Court, 2012)
People v. Gonzales
253 P.3d 185 (California Supreme Court, 2011)
People v. Kelly
822 P.2d 385 (California Supreme Court, 1992)
People v. Gardeley
927 P.2d 713 (California Supreme Court, 1996)
People v. Cuevas
906 P.2d 1290 (California Supreme Court, 1995)
People v. Lang
782 P.2d 627 (California Supreme Court, 1989)
Foreman & Clark Corp. v. Fallon
479 P.2d 362 (California Supreme Court, 1971)
People v. Trevino
704 P.2d 719 (California Supreme Court, 1985)
People v. Wingo
534 P.2d 1001 (California Supreme Court, 1975)
People v. Musselwhite
954 P.2d 475 (California Supreme Court, 1998)
People v. Johnson
767 P.2d 1047 (California Supreme Court, 1989)
People v. Anderson
447 P.2d 942 (California Supreme Court, 1968)
People v. Sargent
970 P.2d 409 (California Supreme Court, 1999)
People v. Stansbury
846 P.2d 756 (California Supreme Court, 1993)
People v. Mesa
535 P.2d 337 (California Supreme Court, 1975)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
People v. Hernandez CA3, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/people-v-hernandez-ca3-calctapp-2016.