People v. Maestas, B068217

• Decision Date: 13 December 1993
• Docket Number: No. B068217,B068217
• Parties: The PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. Gary Anthony MAESTAS et al., Defendants and Appellants.
• Court: California Court of Appeals Court of Appeals

Page 644

25 Cal.Rptr.2d 644

20 Cal.App.4th 1482

The PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. Gary Anthony MAESTAS et al., Defendants and Appellants.

No. B068217.

Court of Appeal, Second District, Division 7, California.

Dec. 13, 1993.

[20 Cal.App.4th 1484] Steven Schorr, La Jolla, under appointment by the Court of Appeal, for defendant and appellant Gary Anthony Maestas.

Dale B. Metcalf, San Francisco, for defendant and appellant Lynton Young.

Daniel E. Lungren, Atty. Gen., George Williamson, Chief Asst. Atty., Carol Wendelin Pollack, Sr. Asst. Atty. Gen., William T. Harter, Supervising Deputy Atty. Gen., and Joseph P. Furman, Deputy Atty. Gen., for plaintiff and respondent.

FRED WOODS, Associate Justice.

A jury convicted Gary Anthony Maestas (appellant) and Lynton Young (appellant) of assault with a deadly weapon (PEN.CODE, § 245¹, subd. (a)(1)) causing great bodily injury (§ 12022.7). Appellant Maestas admitted a state-prison prior-conviction allegation (§ 667.5, subd. (b)) and the trial court found true ² a serious-felony conviction allegation. (§ 667, subd. (a)) Appellant Maestas was sentenced to state prison for thirteen years and appellant Young for six years.

We find the trial court prejudicially abused its discretion (Evid.Code, § 352.) in admitting gang membership evidence and reverse the judgments.

INTRODUCTION

The events took place Friday night, September 27, 1991, outside a bar in Venice called the Brig Bar. The bar is about 45 by 25 feet and had three pool tables. It was dimly lit except above the pool tables. There were two doors, the front door, kept ajar, faced the street, and the side door which adjoined the enclosed parking lot.

The victim, Jose Alex Andrade, had been playing pool in the bar when a man politely asked if he could speak to him outside. Once outside, the victim was confronted by a second man with a knife. The victim fled, returned, was again accosted by the two men and stabbed in the stomach. The victim identified appellant Maestas as the man who stabbed him and appellant Young as the man who invited him outside.

The defense was alibi. Appellant Young testified. Appellant Maestas did not testify ³ but did call alibi witnesses.

In summarizing the evidence we depart from our usual practice of distilling and making coherent dissonant testimony. Instead we provide a chronological, witness by witness, summary designed to illuminate not only evidentiary strengths and weaknesses but the context of the gang membership evidence.

FACTUAL SUMMARY

Detective James Ellis

As a police detective with the Los Angeles Police Department he was the assigned investigating officer. He visited the Brig Bar to take photographs of both the interior and exterior. The bar has a front and side door. Inside it is dark. There were at least two pool tables. Outside, near the front door, there was a street light.

Doctor Henry Cryer

He is a surgeon and chief of trauma surgery at UCLA Medical Center. He was on duty September 28, 1991, when the victim, Mr. Andrade, was admitted at 12:45 a.m. The victim had a stab wound to his stomach and a laceration of his liver. The injuries were potentially life threatening. Another surgeon operated on the victim.

Jose Alex Andrade ⁴

(Although Mr. Andrade understood most English and spoke some English, he testified through a Spanish interpreter.) On Friday, September 27, 1991, he went to the Brig Bar. He arrived about 6:30 p.m. and started playing pool and drinking beer. He played pool with his brother George ⁵ who was already in the bar when he arrived. He also played pool with other people whose names he didn't know. From 6:30 to 8:00 p.m. he had about four beers. He left the bar about 8 p.m. to see a friend, Kevin Manolatos. ⁶ He returned to the bar about 9 p.m. and resumed playing pool and drinking beer. ⁷ From 9 p.m. until he left the bar he had three or four more beers, he wasn't sure of the exact number. When asked if he felt intoxicated, he replied: "Not quite. Yes. With two or three beers, you already start to feel the effect. And, yes, with eight, I could have been slightly under the influence." Asked if "You were feeling high, in other words?" he answered "Yes, but not stupid." He said he wasn't drunk.

Close to midnight, he wasn't sure of the time, ⁸ he began talking to a woman he had met in other bars. Her name was Sona Brara. She was sitting at the bar drinking Jack Daniels and Coke and he sat beside her. The bar was "packed," there were 80-100 people inside, and he couldn't tell if Sona was with anyone. He talked to Sona for about ten minutes. She asked him for a ride home and he agreed.

Then appellant Young, in a very polite way, asked him "whether [he] had a minute and to please go outside with him." Appellant Young was alone. They walked out the front door and he saw appellant Maestas standing by the light post holding a knife. Appellant Maestas said he, Mr. Andrade, had been "talking to his 'ruca' inside the bar." "Ruca" means girlfriend or "old lady" in street slang. He was about two-three feet from appellant Young and about three-four feet from appellant Maestas. Appellants tried to hit him with their fists but Mr. Andrade ran away into an alley and around the block. They didn't chase him.

Mr. Andrade returned to the side door of the bar and told the bouncer, Hugh Acosta, two people were trying to beat him up. The bouncer told him to go home.

Mr. Andrade walked through the parking lot toward his truck, parked across the street from the front entrance. He stepped off the curb, took about three steps when he was "attacked ... from behind." Appellant Young hit him on the head and Mr. Andrade turned and "saw them." Appellant Young was on the left, appellant Maestas on the right. Appellant Young grabbed Mr. Andrade's arms "really hard" and appellant Maestas stabbed him in the stomach. Appellants hit him four or five more times, Mr. Andrade fell down, appellant Maestas swung at him several more times and cut Mr. Andrade's lip. They also kicked him. This all happened fast. Mr. Andrade remained on the ground briefly, then got up, ⁹ and went to his truck, and started driving home.

At some point he saw a CHP vehicle, stopped, and asked the officer for assistance. The CHP officer called paramedics who took Mr. Andrade to the UCLA hospital. He remained there six days.

Mr. Andrade did not remember how appellant Young was dressed that evening nor if he had any identifying marks or scars. He did remember that appellant Young had a moustache and did not wear glasses or a hat. He told the CHP officer that his assailants were both Mexican but he knew one was Mexican and the other mulatto.

Mr. Andrade remembered that appellant Maestas had a moustache that evening but couldn't recall if he had any scars or tattoos. He didn't know what kind of clothing appellant Maestas wore but remembered that one of the men wore a hat. Mr. Andrade testified as follows concerning the hat: "It was a regular hat. It wasn't made out of cloth. It was made out of felt." "It was a cheap kind of hat. I couldn't define what brand or what kind it was." "It could have been white at one time, but it was discolored." When asked "We're not talking about a baseball cap that has a visor, are we"? he answered, "Yes. That's exactly what we're talking about." Still later, when asked "This baseball cap with the visor on it, did it have any kind of insignia like Dodgers or Angels or Brewers or anything on it"? He replied "There is a misunderstanding here. We are not talking about a baseball cap. We are talking about a hat." "I never saw a baseball cap."

After the attack, while in the hospital, Mr. Andrade described his assailants to his wife and to his friend Don Duvall. ¹⁰ With this description Mr. Duvall "put it all together" and told Mr. Andrade that the names of his assailants were Maestas and Young.

Thereafter Mr. Andrade was shown photographs without being told the names of the persons depicted. He identified appellants. Mr. Andrade identified appellants at the November 1991 preliminary hearing. He testified he was "positive" appellants had assaulted him.

The prosecution rested.

..........

Defense witnesses for appellant Maestas and appellant Young were interspersed.

John Schoeberl (called by appellant Young)

He was a mechanic and a student at the Los Angeles International Culinary Institute.

He had met appellant Maestas at Miguel Gayton's brother's house about a month or two before the stabbing. He had met appellant Young two or three weeks before the stabbing. Appellant Young was with appellant Maestas. He was friends with appellants, but not close friends. Appellant Maestas was real good friends with Miguel Gayton and his brother.

On September 27, 1991, he went to the Brig Bar with appellants. They arrived between 8-9 p.m. He played pool but did not drink because he had a bad cold. He met Miguel Gayton ¹¹ at the bar.

Appellant Maestas wore jeans, a dark tee shirt, and "a blue L.A. Dodger hat."

Appellant Young wore jeans and a tee shirt.

Appellants drank beer and shot pool.

He saw Mr. Andrade that night, he had seen him in the Brig Bar on prior occasions, and remembered that he was drinking V-8 juice and beer.

He knew Sona Brara and saw her that night in the Brig Bar. She talked to just about every man in the bar. She talked to me, appellant Maestas, and appellant Young. "We all talked to her as a group at one time." She also talked to Mr. Andrade. Sona was not appellant Maestas' girlfriend. Appellant Maestas was not trying to pick up Sona that evening. He told the defense investigator, Mr. Hart, that appellant Maestas did try to pick up Sona that evening.

Appellant Maestas left the Brig Bar about 10:30 p.m. with his wife, a tall blonde woman, 35-40 years old. He knew it was 10:30 p.m. because his friend Greg Dwyer ¹² arrived and he gets off work at 10 p.m. and works in Gardena. Appellant Maestas did not return to the Brig Bar that night.

He saw Mr. Andrade leave...