People v. Noah

• Decision Date: 16 August 1971
• Docket Number: Cr. 15314
• Citation: 487 P.2d 1009,5 Cal.3d 469,96 Cal.Rptr. 441
• Court: California Supreme Court
• Parties: , 487 P.2d 1009 The PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. William M. NOAH et al., Defendants and Appellants. In Bank

Page 441

96 Cal.Rptr. 441

5 Cal.3d 469, 487 P.2d 1009

The PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. William M. NOAH et al., Defendants and Appellants.

Cr. 15314.

Supreme Court of California,

In Bank.

Aug. 16, 1971.

Charles E. Stott, Jr., San Francisco, under appointment by the Supreme Court, for defendants and appellants.

Thomas C. Lynch and Evelle J. Younger, Attys. Gen., Robert R. Granucci and Karl S. Mayer, Deputy Attys. Gen., for plaintiff and respondent.

WRIGHT, Chief Justice.

On retrial, after this court had reversed judgments of conviction for violation of Penal Code section 4500 (malicious aggravated assault by a life prisoner), ¹ a jury found defendants William Noah and Marines Meyers III guilty of violating Penal Code section 4501 (aggravated assault by a prisoner serving a sentence of less than life). Defendants appeal from the judgments entered on the verdicts.

Defendant Meyers contends that, as a prisoner serving a life term at the time of the offense, he cannot be properly convicted of violating section 4501 and that the trial court's instruction to the jury that section 4501 was a lesser included offense within section 4500 was, therefore, erroneous as to him. ² In addition, both defendants contend that the court erred in refusing to give instructions on other offenses which, they assert, are necessarily included within section 4500, ³ and in giving incomplete instructions regarding the effect of diminished capacity caused by mental disease or defect. For reasons that will appear we have concluded that section 4501 is applicable only to persons serving a term of less than life imprisonment and that the judgment of conviction of defendant Meyers must, therefore, be modified and as modified, affirmed, and that the judgment of conviction of defendant Noah should be affirmed.

Sometime after 10 a.m. on April 30, 1967, several inmates in the maximum security wing of Soledad prison were released from their cells for exercise in the corridor on which the cells fronted. Shortly thereafter, two correctional officers noticed that defendants and two other inmates, Chacon and Smith, were involved in a fight during which Noah, Meyers and Chacon stabbed Smith. The inmates ignored an order to stop the fight and return to their cells. Instead, they continued to stab Smith. Noah and Chacon then dragged Smith by his legs down the tier to the outside of a cell occupied by Garcia, while Meyers walked behind near Smith's head. Defendants and Chacon then propped Smith up against Garcia's cell, where he was apparently stabbed again by someone inside the cell. Tear gas used by the guards then forced Noah, Meyers and Chacon to withdrawn to Noah's cell. Following the incident, Smith underwent surgery for some 40 to 50 stab wounds on his body. Noah was found to have a stab wound on his arm.

Smith testified that he started the fight with a knife that he was carrying to protect himself from Meyers with whom he had had an earlier altercation at another correctional facility. Smith claimed that he had stabbed at Noah after the latter accused him of cheating in a gambling game, and that he had stabbed at Meyers when Meyers came to Noah's aid. Smith also acknowledged that he had made a homosexual advance towards Meyers. Meyers testified that Smith had attacked Noah when Noah objected to Smith's homosexual advance towards Meyers. Meyers admitted that he was in possession of a knife. Two correctional officers who had witnessed the fight in progress, but did not see the events leading up to it, testified that they had not seen any weapon in Smith's possession, but did see knifelike weapons in the hands of defendants and Chacon. Another inmate corroborated Meyers' and Smith's version of the incident. Noah did not take the stand.

The theory of the defense was that Smith initiated the fight, defendants acted in self-defense, and the excessive force used by them was caused by uncontrollable rage resulting from mental defects or disease. The defense offered psychiatric evidence that Noah had an abnormal electroencephalogram indicating brain malfunction which would affect his ability to exercise rational judgment in high stress situations. Dr. Greenberg, a psychiatrist, testified that Noah's judgment would be markedly impaired and his control over his behavior 'extremely' impaired so that it was probable that he would not realize that an opponent had broken off his attack. He also testified that it was improbable that Noah would be able to distinguish right from wrong during an affray and that, as a result of underlying brain disease, Noah engaged in impulsive behavior during periods in which he was incapable of governing his actions. Dr. Ohanian, a psychologist, reached similar conclusions on the basis of tests which he had administered to Noah.

Dr. Peschau, a psychiatrist, testified that Meyers' capacity to form malice was impaired and that, at the time of the incident, Meyers was not able to formulate malice although he was aware that society forbade his assaultive acts. Dr. Peschau testified that Meyers was legally sane, but was emotionally disturbed and had some electroencephalographic changes which would contribute to his emotional disturbances.

Psychiatric evidence presented by the prosecution suggested that although Noah had an assaultive personality, and was impulsive and erratic, his judgment was intact. Testimony was to the effect that Noah was aware of the consequences of his acts and that the acts were unlawful, and that he did not suffer from a mental disorder. Prosecution experts testified that Meyers was able to form malice and specific intent to assault during a rage.

Both defendants were charged by information with violation of Penal Code section 4500, which provides in relevant part: 'Every person undergoing a life sentence in a state prison of this state, who, with malice aforethought, commits an assault upon the person of another, other than another inmate, with a deadly weapon or instrument, or by any means of force likely to produce great bodily injury is punishable with death; however, in cases in which * * * the person so assaulted is another inmate, the punishment shall be death or imprisonment in the state prison for life without possibility of parole for nine years, at the discretion of the court or jury trying the same * * *.' The trial court instructed the jury that violation of section 4500 necessarily includes as a lesser offense violation of section 4501. The trial court also instructed the jury that if there was a reasonable doubt as to whether defendant Meyers had the mental capacity to harbor malice he could not be found guilty of malicious assault by a life prisoner, but the court refused to give Meyers' proffered instruction that he could nevertheless be found guilty of battery or felonious assault or to give instructions defining those offenses.

Penal Code section 4501, violation of which the trial court ruled was a lesser offense within section 4500, provides: 'Every person confined in a state prison of this state Except one undergoing a life sentence who commits an assault upon the person of another with a deadly weapon or instrument or by any means of force likely to produce great bodily injury, shall be guilty of a felony and shall be imprisoned in the state prison not less than three years.' (Italics added.)

It is undisputed that Meyers was serving a life sentence on April 30, 1967. The People contend that he may nonetheless be convicted of violating section 4501 as the clause 'except one undergoing a life sentence' defines neither an element of the offense nor an affirmative defense. Although the purpose of the statutory scheme for punishment of felonious assaults by prisoners in state prisons would undoubtedly be furthered by adoption of the construction urged by the People, both the legislative history and the unequivocal language of section 4501 preclude that construction. (See In re King (1970) 3 Cal.3d 226, 237, 90 Cal.Rptr. 15, 474 P.2d 982; People v. Stevenson (1962) 58 Cal.2d 794, 798, 26 Cal.Rptr. 297, 376 P.2d 297.)

Before 1937 only two sections of the Penal Code dealt with assaults with a deadly weapon. The first, section 245, now incorporated within section 245, subdivision (a), applied to the general population and punished 'Every person who commits an assault upon the person of another with a deadly weapon or instrument or by any means of force likely to produce great bodily injury * * *.' The second, former section 246, was reenacted in 1941 as the present section 4500. Then, as now, the section applied only to life prisoners who committed an aggravated assault with malice aforethought. In 1937, the Legislature enacted former section 246a, the forerunner of the present section 4501, which provided: 'Every person undergoing a sentence of less than life in a State prison of this State, who, with malice aforethought commits an assault upon the person of another with a deadly weapon or instrument or by any means of force likely to produce great bodily injury shall be guilty of a felony and shall be imprisoned in the State prison not less than one year.' (Stats.1937, ch. 541, p. 1554, § 1.)

Like section 246, section 246a was enacted for the purpose of promoting prison safety and was clearly intended to apply only to prisoners serving a sentence of less than life. At the time of its adoption both sections 246 and 246a prohibited identical conduct. The distinction between the two sections lay only in the status of the prisoner who committed the assault and the provision of a lesser penalty for prisoners serving a sentence of less than life. (See, The Work of the 1937 California Legislature (1937) 11 So.Cal.L.Rev. 1, 64--65.)

In 1964, former sections 246 and 246a were repealed and reenacted as sections 4500 and 4501, respectively. (Stats.1941, ch. 106, p. 1124, § 15 and p. 1132, § 16.) In 1959, the Legislature amended section 4501 to eliminate the...