People v. Gomez-Ortiz

• Docket Number: G060857
• Decision Date: 02 May 2023
• Parties: THE PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. JUAN EDUARDO GOMEZ-ORTIZ, Defendant and Appellant.
• Court: California Court of Appeals Court of Appeals

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THE PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. JUAN EDUARDO GOMEZ-ORTIZ, Defendant and Appellant.

G060857

California Court of Appeals, Fourth District, Third Division

May 2, 2023

NOT TO BE PUBLISHED

Appeal from postjudgment orders of the Superior Court of Orange County, No. 17WF0693, Scott A. Steiner, Judge. Reversed and remanded with directions.

Tonja R. Torres, under appointment by the Court of Appeal, for Defendant and Appellant.

Rob Bonta, Attorney General, Lance E. Winters, Chief Assistant Attorney General, Charles C. Ragland, Assistant Attorney General, Christopher P. Beesley and Michael D. Butera, Deputy Attorneys General, for Plaintiff and Respondent.

OPINION

DELANEY, J.

I. INTRODUCTION

Appellant Juan Eduardo Gomez-Ortiz challenges the denial of his motion to vacate a judgment of conviction (based on a guilty plea) pursuant to Penal Code section 1473.6 (all undesignated statutory references are to this code unless otherwise specified). The appeal also seeks our independent review of the trial court's ruling on a supporting Pitchess^[1] motion for discovery of a former sheriff deputy's personnel records.

The underlying conviction involves an attempted robbery where the victim was hospitalized. The matter was investigated by the former deputy, who filed a report falsely stating pictures of the victim's injuries had been booked as investigative evidence. Pursuant to a plea agreement, appellant pleaded guilty to attempted robbery, assault likely to cause great bodily injury, and admitted inflicting great bodily injury. The trial court suspended imposition of sentence and its 2017 judgment ordered appellant to serve 180 days in county jail and three years probation.

In 2019, Orange County law enforcement agencies wrote two letters regarding evidence booking failures that led appellant to file his underlying 2020 vacatur motion as well as the supporting Pitchess motion. The latter resulted in the trial court ordering some information from the former deputy's records to be disclosed. On the vacatur motion, the court ruled appellant was not entitled to an evidentiary hearing based on case precedent.

We conclude both rulings were erroneous. On the Pitchess motion, we cannot determine whether the trial court exercised its discretion about information arising from investigations. On the vacatur motion, we cannot conclude the denial of an evidentiary hearing was the correct result. We reverse and remand for further proceedings.

II. FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND

A. Investigation of Attempted Robbery and Arrest of Gomez-Ortiz

Based on the investigative report of former Orange County Sheriff's Deputy Bryce Simpson, in March 2017, after 2:00 a.m. in the morning on a street in Stanton, two individuals confronted victim T.B. for his money and then one repeatedly punched T.B. in the face. T.B. defended himself with his pocketknife by cutting his attacker, who then fled the scene.

Simpson was part of the law enforcement response and made contact with T.B. in the back of an ambulance, before it transported T.B. to a medical center. According to Simpson's report, T.B.'s face was swollen and his right eye swollen shut. The report represented T.B.'s version of events, including where he had been "drinking" before and where he had been going when attacked. The report noted T.B. was unsure he would be able to identify his attacker.

Simpson continued his interview of T.B. at the medical center and reported T.B.'s injuries consisted of "[m]ultiple facial fractures above and below each eye socket." Simpson's report lists a doctor and four sheriff's deputies witnesses, with no description of what information they purportedly possessed.

During the interview of T.B., appellant arrived at the same medical center with a cut wound. Simpson had a discussion in English with appellant, who claimed he had been injured by a broken glass bottle in a home accident.

According to his report, Simpson investigated the explanation and concluded appellant was T.B.'s attacker. Simpson then conducted an "in-field show-up" near Simpson's patrol vehicle where T.B., while standing 10 feet away from appellant, unequivocally identified appellant as the attacker. When Simpson placed appellant under arrest appellant claimed he only understood Spanish, so a fellow deputy was secured to translate and advise appellant of his Miranda ^[2] rights.

According to Simpson's report, after appellant affirmed his understanding and waiver of rights in Spanish, he maintained he had nothing to do with the attempted robbery of T.B. Appellant elaborated on explaining his own wound, identified a new corroborating witness, and explained "his hand and knuckles were swollen from falling on [his home] stairs."

In addition to his observations on the night of the attack, Simpson reported he had taken pictures of T.B.'s injuries and booked as investigative evidence one "[c]ompact [d]is[c] containing photographs." The parties discuss the compact disc (CD) in their briefing as containing three pictures of T.B.'s injuries that have never been verified.

B. Charges, Informal Discovery, and Guilty Plea Conviction

Two days after Simpson's report, the Orange County District Attorney's Office filed a complaint alleging appellant had committed attempted second degree robbery (§§ 664, subd. (a), 211, 212.5, subd. (a)), assault by means of force likely to cause great bodily injury (§ 245, subd. (a)(4)), and that appellant personally inflicted great bodily injury on his victim in committing both crimes (§ 12022.7, subd. (a)). The charges implicated a maximum sentence of six years in prison and two strikes for future possible sentencing under the Three Strikes law. (See §§ 667, subd. (c), 1170.12.)

At arraignment, appellant pleaded not guilty and his appointed counsel from the Orange County Public Defender's Office made an informal request for discovery to the prosecutor. While some materials were produced in response they did not include the CD of pictures indicated in Simpson's report, even though the scope of the discovery request covered the pictures. (See § 1054.1 [discovery disclosures by prosecutor should include "[a]ll relevant real evidence seized or obtained as a part of the investigation of the offenses charged"].)

Based on the record presented, no further discovery efforts were made by the time of appellant's plea agreement with the prosecutor, entered six weeks after arraignment. With assistance from his counsel and a translator, appellant completed and signed a seven-page form titled "Advisement and Waiver of Rights For a Felony Guilty Plea" (plea form). It contained the following admissions by appellant, meant to serve as the factual basis of his guilty plea: "[O]n March 26, 2017[,] I did willfully and unlawfully by means of force or fear attempt to take the real and personal property of T[.]B. from his immediate presence and also committed an assault upon his person with force likely to cause great bodily injury and did personally inflict great bodily injury." On the next page, appellant's counsel signed the plea form representing counsel had "discussed the charges and the facts with appellant," as well as "the possible defenses" and "possible sentence ranges."

The plea form also included waivers of legal rights that appellant affirmed were knowingly and voluntarily made. Appellant's waivers covered, among others, his rights to a preliminary hearing, to not incriminate himself, to confront witnesses and evidence against him, and to a speedy and public jury trial.

The same day appellant signed his May 2017 plea form, the trial court questioned appellant on his understanding of the form's contents and then accepted his guilty plea. The court suspended imposition of sentence and placed appellant on three years of formal probation on the condition of serving 180 days in county jail. According to the parties, T.B. died the following year of causes unrelated to this matter.

C. Postconviction Events

In a letter dated March 29, 2019, a prosecutor of the Orange County District Attorney's Office notified the Orange County Public Defender's Office that Simpson's CD of investigation pictures was "never booked into evidence" (the March letter). In its substantive entirety, the letter communicated the following:

"This letter is to notify you that the evidence in the above referenced case, to wit: a compact dis[c] with 3 photographs was never booked into evidence at the Orange County Sheriff's department. All other items of evidence, including the in Field Show-Up Form, the signed Medical Release Authorization Form, and the victim's t-shirt, blue jeans and shoes, appear to have been booked into evidence. On 5/8/17, the defendant entered a plea of guilty to 664(a)-211/212.5(c) PC, 245(a)(4) PC, and admitted two enhancements pursuant to 12022.7(a) PC, and was placed on three years formal probation and ordered to serve 180 days in jail. Please let me know if you need additional information."

Eight months later, in November 2019, the district attorney wrote to the Orange County Sheriff memorializing that the district attorney had recently been informed about the sheriff's department's February 2019 "wide-scale internal audit" of its investigation reports (the November letter). According to the November letter, the department's audit included a finding where, "in 47 [percent] of . . . 121 reports where deputies stated they had collected and booked evidence, there was no evidence booked." The appellate record is unclear on precisely when the November letter or its information was delivered to appellant or his counsel, but the point is immaterial to our disposition here.^[3]

In June 2020, former deputy Simpson pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor violation of ...