In re Morganti
| Decision Date | 16 April 2012 |
| Docket Number | No. A132610.,A132610. |
| Citation | 12 Cal. Daily Op. Serv. 3587,204 Cal.App.4th 904,2012 Daily Journal D.A.R. 4115,139 Cal.Rptr.3d 430 |
| Court | California Court of Appeals Court of Appeals |
| Parties | In re Christopher MORGANTI, on Habeas Corpus. |
OPINION TEXT STARTS HERE
Kamala D. Harris, Attorney General, Julie L. Garland, Sr. Asst. Atty. General, Anya M. Binsacca, Supervising Dep. A.G., Amber N. Wipfler, Deputy Atty. General, for Appellant.
Michael Satris, Bolinas, for Respondent.
The People appeal from an order granting Christopher Morganti's petition for a writ of habeas corpus and directing the Board of Parole Hearings (the Board) to hold a new hearing to determine whether to fix a release date for Morganti. Like the trial court, we conclude that, even applying the ultra-lenient “some evidence” standard, the Board's decision that Morganti is unsuitable for parole cannot be upheld. Accordingly, we affirm the superior court's decision granting habeas corpus relief.
Morganti was born in Healdsburg in 1951 into an intact and religious Italian–American family. He suffered no abuse or neglect or other trauma as a child, and has no history of juvenile convictions. He attended parochial schools until he graduated from high school in 1970, when he enrolled in Santa Rosa Junior College. He dropped out of junior college before the end of his first year and obtained employment as a carpenter. During the next five years, while working as a carpenter, he drank beer and smoked marijuana regularly. He gradually became addicted to cocaine, by the late 1970s was “ shooting” cocaine intravenously, and in order to support this habit began selling it.
In 1977 Morganti moved to the State of Washington, where he obtained a contractor's license and started his own construction company. He got married and had a child, and also adopted his wife's son. After five years he and his wife divorced, and in 1987 Morganti moved back to Sonoma County to care for his father, who had cancer. During the two years he cared for his father, Morganti's drug use escalated, and at one point he was injecting or ingesting as much as an ounce of cocaine daily. Following his father's death, Morganti remarried. The commitment offense took place six weeks later, on November 16, 1991.
Morganti and Ron Turner, an employee of the Le Grande Motel in Cloverdale, were both “heavily involved in drugs.” Morganti supplied Turner with cocaine in return for the free use of motel rooms. In order to hide the transaction from the owner of the motel, Morganti would give Turner his credit card on the understanding Turner would later “pull” the charge slips before they were processed by the credit card company. When Turner failed to do this on one occasion, Morganti received a credit card bill for $763. After receiving several more such bills—and at a time at which he “had been high every day, up three or four days[,] and then sleep and then up again”—Morganti confronted Turner in his room at the motel. In a rage, he stabbed Turner 26 times with a knife he had brought with him. He then set fire to the room and fled. He was arrested three days later. In June 1993 a jury found Morganti guilty of second degree murder and arson of an inhabited structure, and he was sentenced to state prison for 21 years to life. These are the only violent crimes Morganti has committed.1
As noted in the most recent psychological evaluation, Morganti “has functioned without behavioral problems for almost 20 years, “worked consistently and regularly” while in prison, most recently as the lead man in the butcher shop. “He generally receives above average to superior evaluations for both relationships and performance.” He has also worked on the Waste Control Crew and earned a certificate qualifying him as a Lift Truck Operator. He has applied for a computer repair program but has remained on the waiting list for more than three years. He has consistently participated for many years in Alcoholics Anonymous (AA), Narcotics Anonymous (NA), Overcomers Outreach (a faith-based 12–step program), and numerous other rehabilitative programs, including classes in stress and anger management. However, his desire to participate in such programs has been frustrated by the elimination of some of them and cutbacks in others, due to reductions in the budget of the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR).
When Morganti first arrived in prison he “had a few friends in the biker group” whom he met “through my first cellie”; those relationships ended years ago, when he returned to the Catholic faith and became actively involved in church-sponsored programs. Though he previously spent a great deal of his free time engaging in physical activities and exercise, these activities have been “severely limited” by serious medical problems: he has been diagnosed with heart disease, emphysema, hyperlipidemia, hepatitis C, chronic viral illness, and cardiac arythmia, and in 2007 he underwent cardiac bypass surgery. He now uses his free time to
Morganti has plans in the event he is released on parole. He owns his own house, has numerous physically undemanding job offers, was left money by his mother, and, as indicated by numerous letters sent to the Board in his behalf, has a significant amount of support from family members, former neighbors, classmates, teachers, and others in the Healdsburg community with whom he corresponds, several of whom have offered him employment in the event his “medical issues” allow it. The Board also received a letter from a friend who stated her willingness to transport Morganti to and from support group meetings, such as AA and NA, if he needed such assistance.
On March 24, 2010, shortly before Morganti's most recent parole hearing, Dr. Michael Pritchard submitted a 14–page comprehensive risk assessment to the Board. Dr. Pritchard stated that Morganti has made a “commitment to abstinence from intoxicating substances,” and participated in AA and NA even though “he believes they are not essential to his sobriety,” and “intends to rely on the support of his church as well as attending NA meetings if he returns to the community.” Because “sobriety in a highly controlled and structured milieu such as prison does not necessarily generalize to the free community,” Dr. Pritchard opined that the “risk of relapse” might be mitigated “by ongoing participation in NA or AA meetings, adherence to said organizations' guiding principles and/or the maintenance of an AA or NA sponsor in the free community, in addition to having a well-defined relapse prevention plan.”
When asked by Dr. Pritchard to assess himself, Morganti wrote: Dr. Pritchard commended Morganti for speaking “openly and directly,” and observed that his statements are “not inaccurate, although perhaps self-serving.” He also felt Morganti's revelations about his past use of controlled substances were “a product of thoughtful reflection on his history of substance abuse.”
In assessing the risk of violence presented by Morganti's release on parole, Dr. Pritchard utilized “a combination of actuarially-derived and structured professional judgment approaches,” specifically the “Psychopathy Check List–Revised” (PCL–R) approach and that prescribed by the “Historical–Clinical–Risk Management–20” (HCR–20). Additionally, for assessment of the general risk for criminal recidivism, Dr. Pritchard employed the “Level of Service/Case Management Inventory” (LS/CMI) protocol. According to him,
Dr. Pritchard stated that under the PCL–R Morganti “obtained a total score ... which placed him in the Low Range of Psychopathy when compared to other North American offenders at approximately the 5th percentile.” Morganti's overall score as measured by the “HCR–20 was [also] in the Low Range of violent recidivism,” as was his LS/CMI score, which indicated that “he is at the Low Risk/Need Level for recidivism of any kind at approximately the 5th percentile in the population of U.S. male offenses.”
Dr. Pritchard's overall assessment of Morganti was that ...
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