People v. Loyd CA1/4

CourtCalifornia Court of Appeal
DecidedJanuary 15, 2021
DocketA159458
StatusUnpublished

This text of People v. Loyd CA1/4 (People v. Loyd CA1/4) 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. Loyd CA1/4, (Cal. Ct. App. 2021).

Opinion

Filed 1/15/21 P. v. Loyd CA1/4 NOT TO BE PUBLISHED IN OFFICIAL REPORTS California Rules of Court, rule 8.1115(a), prohibits courts and parties from citing or relying on opinions not certified for publi- cation or ordered published, except as specified by rule 8.1115(b). This opinion has not been certified for publication or or- dered published for purposes of rule 8.1115.

IN THE COURT OF APPEAL OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA

FIRST APPELLATE DISTRICT

DIVISION FOUR

THE PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Respondent, A159458 v. DANIEL RAY LOYD, (Lake County Super. Ct. No. CR-927420) Defendant and Appellant.

Daniel Ray Loyd appeals the denial of a petition under Penal Code section 1170.95,1 which authorizes resentencing of persons convicted of felony murder under circumstances that no longer support a conviction of felony murder under section 189 as modified by Senate Bill No. 1437 (2017-2018 Reg. Sess.). Appellant was convicted of felony murder for causing the death of Cindy Quiett by unintentionally shooting her during an attempted robbery. Appellant contends that the trial court erred by denying his resentencing petition without holding an evidentiary hearing to consider a theory not raised at his trial, that Quiett was actually killed by a bullet fired by an unidentified second shooter. However, the jury necessarily found that appellant was Quiett’s actual killer, and section 1170.95 does not entitle him to relitigate that fact. We will affirm the order denying his petition.

1 All statutory references are to the Penal Code.

1 Factual and Procedural History This court affirmed appellant’s conviction in People v. Loyd (Dec. 5, 2017, A149159 [nonpub. opn.]). The opinion describes how appellant’s girlfriend arranged to meet Joey Ryden to buy drugs. Quiett was Ryden’s girlfriend. She accompanied Ryden to the designated meeting place. Appellant attempted to rob Ryden, pointing a loaded gun at his face. Ryden hit appellant’s arm directing the gun away from him but causing appellant to fire a bullet that fatally struck Quiett. It was undisputed that appellant did not intend to shoot Quiett. At trial, it also was undisputed that the bullet fired from appellant’s gun caused Quiett’s death. Appellant’s appointed counsel, J. David Markham, did not offer evidence or argue that anyone else at the scene had fired or carried a gun. This approach was contrary to the wishes of appellant, who had filed several unsuccessful pretrial motions for the appointment of new counsel (People v. Marsden (1970) 2 Cal.3d 118) based on his complaint that Markham had not adequately investigated and was refusing to present a “second shooter” theory. The jury found appellant guilty of first degree murder (§ 187, subd. (a)), attempted robbery (§§ 211, 664), assault with a firearm (§ 245, subd. (a)(2)), and being a felon in possession of a firearm (former § 12021, subd. (a)(1)) and ammunition (former § 12316, subd. (b)(1)). The jury found true special- circumstance allegations that appellant committed the murder during an attempted robbery (§ 190.2, subd. (a)(17)) and that he personally used a firearm during the offenses (§§ 1203.06, subd. (a)(1), 12022.5, subd. (a), 12022.53, subd. (b)). After the verdict, the court appointed new counsel, William Conwell, who filed a motion for new trial contending that Markham’s failure to develop

2 a second-shooter theory had denied appellant the effective assistance of counsel. The court denied the motion. This court affirmed appellant’s conviction. Appellant contended on appeal that the court should have instructed the jury that “if it found that ‘Ryden’s conduct’ caused Quiett’s death, appellant could not be convicted of felony-murder.” (People v. Loyd, supra, A149159 [nonpub. opn.].) In appellant’s view, evidence that Ryden “ ‘caus[ed] appellant’s firearm to point at [Quiett] and discharge without appellant relinquishing contact with it’ raised a ‘jury question as to whether appellant or Ryden caused the fatal shot.’ ” (Ibid.) This court rejected the contention, observing that the argument “conflates two distinct issues: the commission of the fatal act and the legal cause of Quiett’s death. Only one person committed the fatal act of pulling the trigger and shooting the gun—that person was appellant.” (Ibid.) Even if Ryden’s conduct contributed to the fatal shooting, the opinion explained, that did not preclude the finding that appellant’s conduct was also a legal cause of the killing. This was not “a variant of the third-party shooter scenario,” as appellant contended, for he “was the only shooter here.” (Ibid.) In rejecting the related claim that the jury should have been instructed on the doctrine of provocative-conduct murder,2 the opinion stated, “[a]s appellant implicitly concedes, Ryden did not wrest the gun from appellant or attempt to shoot anyone. Appellant shot the gun that [fired the bullet that] fatally struck Quiett.” (Ibid.)

2 The doctrine of provocative-conduct murder would have enabled the jury to find appellant guilty of second rather than first degree murder. Under that doctrine, a person can be held “vicariously liable for a killing by a third party” if the third party’s fatal act was a reasonable response to a malicious act committed by the defendant during a violent felony. The doctrine did not apply, given that “appellant himself committed the fatal act.”

3 The prior opinion also upheld the denial of appellant’s Marsden and new-trial motions, which claimed that Markham had provided ineffective assistance by failing to develop and present a “second shooter” theory. Appellant pointed out that Quiett’s exit wound was lower than the entrance wound, and argued that therefore either the shooter had been at a higher elevation than Quiett, which he had not been, or that she had been leaning forward when the bullet hit her. In response to three Marsden motions, Markham explained that the ballistics expert he retained had concluded that the fact that “the exit wound . . . was lower than the entrance wound did not exclude appellant as [the] killer.” (People v. Loyd, supra, A149159 [nonpub. opn.].) In appellant’s view, that analysis “hinged on the premise that Quiett was leaning forward when she was shot,” so appellant “wanted Markham to argue that Quiett was standing erect when she was shot by a second[,] unknown assailant. Markham explained that he did not have sufficient evidence to present this theory because nobody saw Quiett before she was shot and there was no evidence of a second shooter.” (Ibid.) Although some witnesses said that they had seen Quiett standing, those witnesses had not seen her when she was shot. In opposing the new-trial motion, the prosecutor relied on “the dearth of credible evidence to support appellant’s second shooter theory and a detailed declaration from Markham [about] his investigation of the case and strategies.” (People v. Loyd, supra, A149159 [nonpub. opn.].) At an evidentiary hearing on the motion, “the defense elicited testimony from a new expert who opined that if Cindy Quiett was standing erect when she was shot, appellant’s bullet could not have killed her, but she could have been killed by an assailant shooting down at her from a higher area.” (Ibid.) The trial court

4 denied the motion in a lengthy order. It “conducted an extensive review of the trial evidence before concluding that this theory was not a potentially meritorious defense, pointing out that, among other things, nobody reported hearing two shots; there was no evidence that Quiett was standing erect when she was shot; and there was ‘no other shooter suspect.’ In light of the evidentiary record, the court concluded that using the location of the exit wound . . . to argue there was a second shooter was speculative and fanciful.

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Related

People v. Coefield
236 P.2d 570 (California Supreme Court, 1951)
People v. Marsden
465 P.2d 44 (California Supreme Court, 1970)
People v. Billa
79 P.3d 542 (California Supreme Court, 2003)
People v. Washington
402 P.2d 130 (California Supreme Court, 1965)
People v. Jackson
376 P.3d 528 (California Supreme Court, 2016)
People v. Gentile
477 P.3d 539 (California Supreme Court, 2020)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
People v. Loyd CA1/4, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/people-v-loyd-ca14-calctapp-2021.