Seiterle v. Superior Court

369 P.2d 697, 57 Cal. 2d 397, 20 Cal. Rptr. 1, 1962 Cal. LEXIS 184
CourtCalifornia Supreme Court
DecidedMarch 15, 1962
DocketL. A. 26574
StatusPublished
Cited by42 cases

This text of 369 P.2d 697 (Seiterle v. Superior Court) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering California Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Seiterle v. Superior Court, 369 P.2d 697, 57 Cal. 2d 397, 20 Cal. Rptr. 1, 1962 Cal. LEXIS 184 (Cal. 1962).

Opinions

DOOLING, J.

The object of this proceeding is to prevent the respondent court from retrying the issue of penalty on two murder counts and so subjecting petitioner to “double prosecution and double punishment for the same act in violation of his constitutional rights forbidding double jeopardy.” (TJ.S. Const., 5th Amend.; Cal. Const., art. I, § 13.)

Petitioner was indicted for the murders of Mr. and Mrs. Charles Duvel, and as to both counts he pleaded guilty to murder in the first degree. He also entered pleas of guilty to charges of several other crimes, including two counts of kidnaping for purposes of robbery with bodily harm and one count of conspiracy to commit murder in the first degree. Upon a trial on the sole issue of penalty, the jury fixed his punishment at death for each of the murders and at life im[399]*399prisonment for each of the kidnaping offenses and for the conspiracy to commit murder. On appeal this court held that the trial court committed prejudicial error by instructing the jury that “a prisoner serving a life sentence might be paroled after seven years,” since the alternate punishment from death provided for lddnaping for purposes of robbery with bodily harm is life imprisonment without possibility of parole (Pen. Code, § 209); and had the jury realized that petitioner “could not be paroled if sentenced to life imprisonment for the kidnapings, it might not have fixed his punishment at' death for the first degree murders.” (People v. Seiterle, 56 Cal.2d 320, 323-324 [14 Cal.Rptr. 681, 316 P.2d 913].) Accordingly, the judgment was “reversed insofar as it relate[d] to the issue of penalty for the offense of first degree murder” but “the portion of the judgment” unqualifiedly “imposing the sentences of life imprisonment for the offenses of kidnaping” was modified by adding the words “without possibility of parole” and “as so modified [was] affirmed.” (56 Cal.2d at p. 324 ; July 24, 1961.)

Retrial of the penalty issue was set for November 6, 1961. Petitioner unsuccessfully argued that such further proceedings contravened the provision of section 654 of the Penal Code precluding multiple prosecutions, and his motion for dismissal of the murder counts was denied.

Petitioner has properly applied to this court for relief. Prohibition is an appropriate remedy to prevent further proceedings in violation of the “successive prosecution” prohibition of section 654, though the criminal acts are not “necessarily included offenses.” (Neal v. State of California, 55 Cal.2d 11, 18 [9 Cal.Rptr. 607, 357 P.2d 839] ; see Rodriguez v. Superior Court, 27 Cal.2d 500, 501 [165 P.2d 1] ; Abelleira v. District Court of Appeal, 17 Cal.2d 280, 291 [109 P.2d 942, 132 A.L.R. 715].)

Section 654 provides: “An act or omission which is made punishable in different ways by different provisions of this code may be punished under either of such provisions, but in no case can it be punished under more than one; an acquittal or conviction and sentence under either one bars a prosecution for the same act or omission under any other.” (Emphasis added.)

It is petitioner’s theory that because he has now been convicted and sentenced under the two counts charging him with kidnaping Mr. and Mrs. Duvel with bodily harm to them, section 654 bars the further prosecution of the two murder [400]*400charges involving the killing of Mr. and Mrs. Duvel as a part of the same transactions. It is only if, as petitioner claims, the record compels the conclusion that the murders of Mr. and Mrs. Duvel were the culmination of an “indivisible” transaction involving their kidnaping with bodily harm and terminating with their ultimate murders that the provisions of section 654 would properly be applicable. (Neal v. State of California, supra, 55 Cal.2d 11, 19 ; People v. Brown, 49 Cal.2d 577, 590-594 [320 P.2d 5].) As we stated in Neal at pages 19-20 :

“Whether a course of criminal conduct is divisible and therefore gives rise to more than one act within the meaning of section 654 depends on the intent and objective of the actor. If all of the offenses were incident to one objective, the defendant may be punished for any one of such offenses but not for more than one.
“Thus in People v. Logan, 41 Cal.2d 279, 290 [260 P.2d 20], defendant, who chose to commit robbery by first knocking out his victim with a baseball bat and then taking his valuables was convicted of both robbery and assault. We reversed the assault conviction on the ground that the double punishment violated section 654. In In re Chapman, 43 Cal.2d 385, 387 [273 P.2d 817], however, we held that when the assault is not a means of perpetrating the robbery but is an act that follows after the robbery is completed the defendant is guilty of two punishable acts. Likewise in People v. Greer, 30 Cal.2d 589, 600 [184 P.2d 512], statutory rape and lewd and lascivious conduct were held to be one act since both offenses arose from a single act of sexual intercourse. In People v. Slobodion, 31 Cal.2d 555, 561-563 [191 P.2d 1], however, we sustained convictions for sex perversion and lewd and lascivious conduct, even though both acts were closely connected in time and a part of the same criminal venture since the act giving rise to the lewd and lascivious conduct was separate and distinct and was not incidental to or the means by which the act of sex perversion was accomplished. ’ ’

At the outset we notice that there was no trial on the issue of guilt of any of the offenses here involved because petitioner pleaded guilty to all of them. By pleading guilty to all of them without reserving, or attempting to reserve in any fashion, the question whether the kidnapings with bodily harm and the murders constituted indivisible transactions so as to prevent their double punishment under Penal Code section 654, petitioner, at least prima facie, admitted that the [401]*401crimes were separate and not indivisible. (See Berg v. United States, 176 F.2d 122 ; Rice v. United States, 30 F.2d 681 ; Ex parte Thomas, 55 F. Supp. 30 ; Ex parte Hall, 94 N.J.Eq. 108 [118 A. 347] ; People ex rel. Hetenji v. Johnston, 10 App.Div.2d 121 [198 N.Y.S.2d 18] ; People ex rel. Hornbeck v. Jackson, 7 App.Div.2d 689 [179 N.Y.S.2d 315], cert. den. 359 U.S. 972 [79 S.Ct. 886, 3 L.Ed.2d 838].)

Evidence concerning the crimes was introduced by the prosecution and defense in the previous trial before a jury to determine the punishments to be imposed for the several crimes to which petitioner had pleaded guilty. That evidence was summarized in People v. Seiterle, supra, 56 Cal.2d at pages 321-322.

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Bluebook (online)
369 P.2d 697, 57 Cal. 2d 397, 20 Cal. Rptr. 1, 1962 Cal. LEXIS 184, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/seiterle-v-superior-court-cal-1962.