People v. Quintanilla

• Decision Date: 06 September 2005
• Docket Number: No. A104009.,A104009.
• Citation: 33 Cal.Rptr.3d 782,132 Cal.App.4th 572
• Court: California Court of Appeals Court of Appeals
• Parties: The PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. Nicolas QUINTANILLA, Defendant and Appellant.

33 Cal.Rptr.3d 782

132 Cal.App.4th 572

The PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. Nicolas QUINTANILLA, Defendant and Appellant.

No. A104009.

Court of Appeal, First District, Division 3.

September 6, 2005.

Certified for Partial Publication.^*

Heather MacKay, by appointment of the Court under the First District Appellate Project's Assisted Case System, for Appellant.

Bill Lockyer, Attorney General of the State of California; Robert R. Anderson, Chief Assistant Attorney General; Gerald A. Engler, Senior Assistant Attorney General; Martin S. Kaye, Supervising Deputy Attorney General; Laurence K. Sullivan, Supervising Deputy Attorney General, for Respondent.

PARRILLI, J.

In this case, a defendant challenges instructions permitting the jury to consider charged domestic violence offenses as evidence of criminal propensity in connection with other domestic violence charges joined for trial. In the published part of our opinion, we hold such instructions are improper, but amounted to harmless error in this case.

After a jury trial, Nicolas Quintanilla was convicted of false imprisonment, inflicting injury on a co-habitant, forced sexual penetration, witness intimidation, assault with force likely to cause great bodily injury, criminal threats, and rape. The court sentenced him to a term of 19 years and 4 months. On appeal, he contends: (1) the witness intimidation conviction must be reversed because he was charged with and convicted of attempting to dissuade a witness from testifying (Pen.Code, § 136.1, subd. (a)), an offense for which there was no supporting evidence and on which the jury was not instructed (instead, it was instructed on the crime of attempting to dissuade a witness from making a police report under Penal Code section 136.1, subdivision (b)); (2) the evidence did not establish the requisite specific intent for forced sexual penetration; (3) the propensity instructions given by the court violated his due process rights; (4) the court improperly restricted defense counsel's cross-examination of the victim; (5) hearsay statements by the victim were erroneously admitted under the spontaneous declaration exception; and (5) the imposition of upper terms and consecutive sentences violated the Blakely rule (Blakely v. Washington (2004) 542 U.S. 296, 124 S.Ct. 2531, 159 L.Ed.2d 403.)

In the unpublished portion of our opinion, we agree the witness intimidation conviction must be reversed. Otherwise, we affirm.

BACKGROUND

Isabel J. had dated Quintanilla in El Salvador in the 1980's. In 1988 she came to the United States and married Michael J. In 1990, during a visit to El Salvador, she met Quintanilla and promised to help him come to the United States. He came in 1991, and Isabel rented him a room and found him a job. They had an on-and-off dating relationship. In 2001, Isabel and Michael separated, and she began seeing Quintanilla again.

Isabel went to Los Angeles at the end of 2001 to visit her mother and sisters for the holidays. When she returned in January 2002, Quintanilla accused her of seeing lovers on the trip. He shook her and struck her in the face and shoulders with his fist, calling her names. Afterward he apologized and said he would never hurt her again. At the end of trial, the prosecutor dismissed a domestic violence charge arising from this incident because there was no proof Isabel and Quintanilla were cohabitants when it occurred.

Isabel moved with her two daughters to an apartment in San Francisco in February or March of 2002. Quintanilla moved in with them a couple of weeks later. Isabel testified that on May 8, 2002, Quintanilla again became jealous and hit her repeatedly in the face, accusing her of sleeping with other men. The jury acquitted Quintanilla on a domestic violence charge arising from this alleged incident. Isabel also testified that on another occasion before May 14, Quintanilla called her from a bar and asked her to join him. She was tired and refused. He came to the apartment, accused her of hiding someone, threatened her with a knife, looked in vain for someone hiding in the apartment or the back yard, and eventually apologized to her. The jury was unable to reach a verdict on a criminal threat charge arising from this incident.

Quintanilla's convictions arose from events occurring on May 14, 2002. That afternoon, he called Isabel at her job in San Mateo and demanded that she come home in 30 minutes. Isabel refused, telling him she had something else to do. At 4:00, she met with her lawyer, Donald Bloom, regarding her child custody dispute with her husband Michael. They discussed accusations Michael had made about Quintanilla and about Isabel's parenting. Bloom prepared a declaration based on this interview, which included the following statements: "My boyfriend [Quintanilla] is a decent person, not some molester or sex fiend like Michael. My boyfriend would never force me to do anything, unlike Michael, who would hold me down and virtually rape me when I told him I did not feel li[k]e sex or force me to perform sex acts on him that hurt me or made me feel bad."

Isabel left Bloom's office around 5:45. Bloom testified she was in good physical condition at that time. Isabel drove home and parked in the driveway of her apartment. She testified that as she approached the building's entrance gate, Quintanilla jumped on her back. Her daughters were still at the baby-sitter's house. Quintanilla took her keys, opened the gate, and forced her into the apartment against her will, holding her by the hair and the waist. Inside, he locked all the doors and began cursing her, threatening to beat her up and kill her, and accusing her of cheating on him. He hit her in the face, pulled her hair, and took a knife from the kitchen, holding it to her throat and telling her she did not deserve to live. After punching her many times around the head and shoulders, Quintanilla took Isabel into her daughters' room and disconnected the phone.

In the bedroom, Quintanilla continued beating Isabel, kicking her as well as hitting her with his fist. He slammed her head against the post of the bunk bed, removed her skirt and panties, and forced his fingers deep into her vagina, which Isabel testified was "very painful." He then smelled his fingers and told Isabel there was no doubt in his mind she was cheating on him. He beat Isabel for an hour or so, threatening to kill her, and to cut off her head and hang it on the wall. She thought she might die when he squeezed her throat so hard she could not breathe. Finally, she was able to calm him down.

Quintanilla pushed Isabel into the bathroom and ordered her to take a shower. She saw that he had thrown the telephone from her daughters' room and another from her bedroom into the toilet. After she showered, Quintanilla took her to her bedroom. She asked him to leave, but he repeatedly raped her at knifepoint, vaginally and anally. The assault stopped at around 11:00 that night.

Isabel told Quintanilla to leave, and eventually he took her car keys and left the apartment. Isabel took one of the phones from the toilet and tried to dry it with a hairdryer to call the police. Quintanilla returned in five minutes, however, and told her she had to come with him. He put his clothes into bags, grabbed Isabel by the shoulders, and took her to the car. Quintanilla drove to Oakland, arriving around midnight. He told Isabel she was going to spend the night with him in an apartment he was remodeling. However, he did not have a key, and drove instead to a friend's house, where he got out of the car. Isabel told him to take his clothes, which he did. She then slid into the driver's seat and drove off, as Quintanilla yelled at her to stop. She drove to a police station, stopping first at an apartment where Quintanilla used to live to ascertain the address so she could give it to the police.

Officer Mike Valladon was called to the downtown Oakland police station around 2:30 a.m., and interviewed Isabel. She was very upset, but Valladon managed to take a statement, and had her injuries photographed. Around 6:00 a.m., Isabel was taken to the emergency room of San Francisco General Hospital. She was seriously bruised; the examining nurse testified her injuries were worse than the nurse usually found in domestic violence cases. Isabel was given two doses of morphine and, later, Vicodin. Sometime after 8:00 she was taken to a rape treatment center, where she was interviewed and examined. The nurse found her injuries "really consistent with the story she told me about what happened to her." Swabs were taken, which detected semen in Isabel's vagina.

Quintanilla was arrested on May 16. He admitted forcing his hand into Isabel's vagina to check whether she had had sex. He admitted hitting Isabel, but only three times. He claimed she had consensual intercourse with him, in an attempt to persuade him to stay with her.

On May 17, Bloom faxed Isabel the declaration he had drawn up based on his interview with her on the 14th. He told her he needed to file it quickly. Isabel testified that she only looked at the signature line, and after signing immediately faxed the declaration back to Bloom. Isabel later reconciled with Michael J., and was living with him and their children at the time of trial.

DISCUSSION

1.-2.^**

3. The Propensity Instructions

Evidence of prior criminal acts is ordinarily inadmissible to show a defendant's disposition to commit such acts. (Evid.Code, § 1101.¹) However, the Legislature has created exceptions to this rule in cases involving sexual offenses (§ 1108) and domestic violence (§ 1109).² Our Supreme Court has held that section 1108 conforms with the requirements of due process. (People v. Falsetta (1999) 21 Cal.4th 903, 922, 89 Cal.Rptr.2d 847, 986 P.2d 182) It has also ruled that CALJIC No. 2.50.01, an instruction explaining the application of section 1108, is proper. (People v. Reliford (2003) 29 Cal.4th 1007, 1012, 130 Cal.Rptr.2d 254, ...