People v. Wagner CA4/2

CourtCalifornia Court of Appeal
DecidedApril 28, 2015
DocketE061166
StatusUnpublished

This text of People v. Wagner CA4/2 (People v. Wagner CA4/2) 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. Wagner CA4/2, (Cal. Ct. App. 2015).

Opinion

Filed 4/28/15 P. v. Wagner CA4/2

NOT TO BE PUBLISHED IN OFFICIAL REPORTS California Rules of Court, rule 8.1115(a), prohibits courts and parties from citing or relying on opinions not certified for publication or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 This opinion has not been certified for publication or ordered published for purposes of rule 8.1115.

IN THE COURT OF APPEAL OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA

FOURTH APPELLATE DISTRICT

DIVISION TWO

THE PEOPLE,

Plaintiff and Respondent, E061166

v. (Super.Ct.No. RIF1303259)

EARL WILLIAM WAGNER, OPINION

Defendant and Appellant.

APPEAL from the Superior Court of Riverside County. Irma Poole Ashberry,

Judge. Affirmed with directions.

Steven J. Carroll, under appointment by the Court of Appeal, for Defendant and

Appellant.

Kamala D. Harris, Attorney General, Julie L. Garland, Assistant Attorney General,

Eric A. Swenson and Heather M. Clark, Deputy Attorneys General, for Plaintiff and

Respondent.

1 A jury convicted defendant, Earl Wagner, of two counts of first degree residential

burglary (Pen. Code, § 459),1 during which a non-accomplice was present (§ 667.5, subd.

(c)(21)), and two counts of receiving stolen property (§ 496, subd. (a)). In bifurcated

proceedings, he admitted suffering five prior convictions, for which he served prison

terms (§ 667.5, subd. (b)), one serious prior conviction (§ 667, subd. (a)) and one strike

prior (§ 667, subds. (c) & (e)(1)). He was sentenced to prison for 15 years, eight months,

and appeals, claiming error occurred in: (1) defense counsel conceding defendant’s guilt

of the charged receiving stolen property offenses, (2) denial of defendant’s motion to

acquit as to one of the charged burglaries, (3) denial of defendant’s motion to disclose

juror identifying information and, (4) imposition of a restitution fine. We reject his

contentions and affirm, while directing the trial court to correct errors in the court

minutes and abstract of judgment.

FACTS

The male renter of a Riverside apartment testified that at 9:45 p.m. on May 24,

2013, he left his apartment to walk his dog, leaving the front door open, but the security

screen door closed. He returned 15-20 minutes later and noticed the screen door was ajar

and his wallet, containing identification and an ATM card, and his live-in girlfriend’s cell

phone were missing. His live-in girlfriend testified that while her boyfriend was out

walking the dog, she was inside the one-bedroom apartment’s bathroom, with the

bathroom door open, putting on makeup. Three to five minutes after her boyfriend had

1 All further statutory references are to the Penal Code unless otherwise indicated.

2 left with the dog, she heard a noise, looked outside the bathroom but saw no one, noticed

that the screen door was ajar and closed the front door. Her cell phone had last been on

the coffee table in the living room, near the front door.

At 9:40 or 9:50 the same night, defendant entered a sober living house across the

street and one door down from the afore-mentioned apartment. He went into the

bathroom and closed the door. When two occupants of the house tried to confront him,

he escaped through another door in the bathroom and went out the back door of the house

and over the backyard fence, as will be described in greater detail later in this opinion.

A police officer testified that around 10:05 that night, he saw defendant, who

matched the description of the person who had entered the sober living house, in the

driveway of a house that backed up to the back yard of the sober living house.

Defendant’s knees were bent, as though he had just jumped the fence that surrounded the

sober living house’s back yard. Defendant disappeared, so the officer knocked on the

door to the house where he had seen defendant in the driveway and after several knocks,

defendant came to the door. Defendant said he was there visiting his friend, “Eric,” but

he could not supply “Eric’s” last name nor the address where he was.

Defendant was convicted of the charged receiving stolen property counts, which

were the wallet and the cell phone taken from the apartment. The jury acquitted

defendant of burglarizing the house when defendant was seen by the officer in the

driveway.

3 ISSUES AND DISCUSSION

1. Defendant’s Concession

On December 2, 2013, the People requested that the standard instruction on a

defendant’s right not to testify be given at the end of trial. On December 3, during

opening statement, defense counsel said, “[M]istakes were made and crimes were

committed in this case and . . . you shouldn’t let anybody slide by on that. The evidence

will show that [defendant] did possess stolen property, the wallet and the cell phone, and

you should hold him accountable for those crimes. [¶] . . . [T]he evidence will show

you that [defendant] did not enter anyone’s home that night with the intent to steal. [¶]

. . . Hold [defendant] accountable for what he did, no more and no less.” During

discussion of jury instructions on December 4, the trial court noted that the People had

requested the instruction on a defendant’s right not to testify, as well as defense counsel’s

lack of objection to it. The court added, however, that during a discussion of the

instructions the day before, off the record, it and counsel “indicate[d], based on . . . what

counsel felt might come out with some of the evidence, that we would need to

revisit . . . [the jury instruction on a defendant’s right not to testify] after evidence was

completed . . . . Obviously, if [defendant] testifies, that will be pulled.”

Later that day, defendant took the stand. He admitted that he had been convicted

in the past of numerous felonies, including burglary and stealing cars on three different

occasions. He said that on May 24, 2013, he had just picked up some methamphetamine,

which he planned to inject, and was riding his bike back to his campsite, when he noticed

things that were being thrown away in a dumpster near an apartment on the same street as

4 the apartment that was burglarized. He looked through the items and found a box

containing the male apartment renter’s wallet and the female apartment renter’s pink cell

phone. He looked inside the wallet and saw that there was no money in it, but there were

identification and credit cards. He wanted to see if the cell phone was working, so he

pushed the power button and it turned on. When asked if he took the wallet and cell

phone with him, he said, “I figured that I could sell it . . . .” He acknowledged that

neither was his. When asked about the arresting officer’s testimony that defendant told

him that the cell phone belonged to the mother of his child, defendant said that he had

two cell phones in his possession when detained by the officer, one of which was a black

touch screen he had borrowed from his girlfriend. When asked if he was testifying that

when the officer asked him about the pink cell phone, and defendant told the officer that

it belonged to his child’s mother, he was actually referring to the black touch-screen,

defendant said he did not know because he was so under the influence that he did not

remember. Upon further questioning, he admitted lying to the officer about the pink cell

phone. He said he went behind the trash can that contained the discarded items and

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Bluebook (online)
People v. Wagner CA4/2, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/people-v-wagner-ca42-calctapp-2015.