People v. Ryner

Decision Date25 January 1985
Citation164 Cal.App.3d 1075,211 Cal.Rptr. 140
CourtCalifornia Court of Appeals Court of Appeals
PartiesPEOPLE of the State of California, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. Chester Lawrence RYNER, Defendant and Appellant. AO17774.

Quin Denvir, State Public Defender, Philip M. Brooks, Deputy State Public Defender, San Francisco, for defendant and appellant.

John K. Van de Kamp, Atty. Gen., Linda Ludlow, Nathan D. Mihara, Deputy Attys. Gen., San Francisco, for plaintiff and respondent.

NEWSOM, Associate Justice.

At 10:30 p.m. on May 5, 1981, the San Jose Police Department responded to a report of a shooting at the Red Spark Lounge, a bar in San Jose. When the officers arrived, the bar was in a state of chaos. A woman, later identified as Darlene Mejia, was lying on the floor, the victim of fatal gunshot wounds to the liver and heart. Two other bar patrons suffered severe gunshot wounds to the chest and head, respectively. A third man incurred a superficial wound. None of the victims were able to identify the assailant, but others present at the scene gave testimony incriminating appellant.

Adolph Sanchez was the bartender on duty at the Red Spark Lounge when the shooting occurred. He recalled that both appellant and codefendant Danny Cordova became involved in an argument with other bar patrons on the dance floor, with appellant being the person doing most of the yelling. According to Sanchez, appellant, who looked Mexican, was wearing a brown Pendleton shirt buttoned only at the top ("chollo" style), jeans, and had curly hair and a mustache. Sanchez directed the attention of Isaac Hernandez, the bar's bouncer, to the disturbance.

Isaac Hernandez testified that at his direction appellant, carrying a beer, was escorted outside by friends. When appellant tried to return, Hernandez confiscated his beer and again demanded he depart. Subsequently, Hernandez was taunted from outside by appellant and his friends, but did not reply. Soon thereafter, one of appellant's companions rushed into the bar and yelled, "He's got a gun." Hernandez immediately advised bartender Sanchez to call the police, then heard five or six gunshots, feeling the "pressure" a bullet fly past his right side. He jumped over the bar to cover.

While Hernandez could not identify appellant as the person responsible for the shooting, he did select a brown Pendleton shirt in which appellant was dressed at the time of his arrest as the same one worn by appellant in the bar on the night of the shooting. Other witnesses corroborated Hernandez' testimony that appellant, or someone similar in appearance, was the person who had an argument with the bouncer just before the shooting.

One witness who observed the altercation between appellant and Hernandez was Victor Garcia. According to Garcia's testimony, a man in a brown plaid Pendleton shirt worn "chollo" style, and who had been arguing with Hernandez, resembled appellant. Like Sanchez and Hernandez, Garcia felt that appellant appeared drunk or "on something" because of the glassy look in his eyes. When the shooting started, Garcia looked toward the door of the bar and saw the forearm of a person firing a small caliber revolver. According to Garcia, the shooter was wearing the same Pendleton shirt worn by the person twice earlier ejected from the bar.

Andrew Armienta, who in return for his testimony had been promised favorable consideration in a drunk driving prosecution testified that he saw appellant and his codefendant leave the bar after an argument with the bouncer. Momentarily, he heard gunshots in the bar, and saw appellant standing by the door with a pistol. He could see part of appellant's face and the Pendleton shirt in which appellant was attired that evening. After the shooting, Armienta went outside and observed appellant and a companion flee in a small green car. He saw the same car again at the scene of the arrest.

Rudy Chavez saw the shooting as he left the Red Spark Lounge. He observed flashes from outside the bar. The person doing the shooting appeared to him to be alone and perhaps was wearing a brown Pendleton shirt. It appeared that the shots were being aimed at the bouncer. Chavez could not, however, identify appellant as the assailant in court. According to Officer Patrick Boyd of the San Jose Police Department, Chavez had previously stated that he might be able to identify the person who did the shooting, but seemed reluctant or scared to do so.

Other witnesses observed men fleeing the scene of the crime immediately after the shooting. At trial, Leo Rodriguez testified that he was sitting outside the bar when the shooting occurred. He saw approximately six people run from the bar, two of whom fled to a small car parked in front of a nearby Newberry's store, one of them being a man he recognized as involved in an earlier altercation with the bouncer. Deborah Carr testified that she heard the shots from outside the Red Spark Lounge, then observed "two guys" run from the bar to a light green car and quickly leave the area.

Amelia Johnston and Mary Carbuena had talked with appellant and another man at Alum Rock Park in San Jose earlier that day. Mary was under the influence of phencyclidine (PCP) and could not remember the encounter. Amelia testified that appellant had a handgun and fired it once in the park. Later that evening, they again saw appellant at the Red Spark Lounge. According to Amelia, appellant wanted to talk with Mary, but she refused. An argument ensued, whereupon the bouncer asked appellant to leave. Neither Amelia nor Mary saw who later fired the shots in the bar. 1

That same evening between 10:30 and 11:00, the police went to an address at Winter Park Way where officers Boyd and John Rutledge spotted a blue-green, four-door Rambler parked in a driveway and partially across the sidewalk. Both the passenger and driver side doors of the car were open. Codefendant Cordova was arrested near the car, and appellant was seen crouched next to a nearby Mercury Monarch occupied by Charlene Brown and Glenda Stewart. The officers saw appellant reach into his pants pocket and appear to throw something into the Mercury. Officer Rutledge repeatedly ordered appellant to rise and move away from the car, and, after a brief delay, he complied. Appellant was immediately handcuffed and arrested.

In the car was found a small amount of change and four .22 magnum caliber cartridges. A similar bullet was later found in appellant's pants pocket. Subsequent laboratory analysis showed that the bullets seized from the car and appellant's pants had the same design and construction characteristics as the one which killed Darlene Mejia and injured the other bar patrons.

Appellant was arrested wearing a brown plaid Pendleton shirt. His fingerprints were found on the blue-green Rambler. Dabbings taken from appellant's hands and shirt were analyzed under an electron microscope by an expert, who testified that particles were found which he identified as probably being gunshot residue.

Appellant did not testify in his own defense at trial. He did offer in rebuttal the testimony of San Jose Police Officer Richard Daulton, who recounted an interview with Andrew Armienta. Dalton testified that Armienta never told him about seeing anyone holding a gun at the door of the bar after the shooting. Neither had Armienta then mentioned that the person who sped away in the green car was the one who did the shooting.

Appellant first complains that he was denied a fair trial because of a conversation which occurred during the course of the trial between Officer Patrick Boyd, a prosecution witness, and a number of the jurors.

The record shows that during a morning recess taken while Officer Boyd was on the stand, the latter engaged in a conversation in the hallway outside the courtroom with some of the jurors. Neither Boyd's testimony nor any aspect of the case was discussed. Rather, topics of conversation included a recent 49er playoff game, the kind of gun Boyd carried, weapons in general, the officer's experiences on the Oakland and San Jose Police forces, his Vietnam military service, and the fact that he was fatigued after working graveyard shift the night before. The discussion between Boyd and the jurors was friendly and apparently loud, as at one point the bailiff asked the group to quiet down.

Upon learning of this conversation, appellant and codefendant Cordova moved for a mistrial on the ground of juror misconduct. A hearing on the motion was held, at which Boyd testified that he did not discuss any aspects of the case with the jurors, and merely participated in the conversation to be friendly and maintain good public relations. The jurors involved in the discussion with Boyd, apparently seven in number, recounted the content of the conversation. All jurors stated that the matter being tried was not mentioned, and none felt that their ability to fairly and impartially decide the case according to the evidence would be compromised by their conversation with Boyd.

Appellant contends that prejudice must be presumed from the juror misconduct, and was not satisfactorily rebutted by the prosecution.

We agree that juror misconduct occurred despite the fact that Officer Boyd and the jurors did not discuss any matters related to the case.

" ' "The right of unbiased and unprejudiced jurors is an inseparable and inalienable part of the right to trial by jury guaranteed by the Constitution." ' " (People v. Diaz (1984) 152 Cal.App.3d 926, 933, 200 Cal.Rptr. 77; People v. Galloway (1927) 202 Cal. 81, 92, 259 P. 332, quoting Weathers v. Kaiser Foundation Hospitals (1971) 5 Cal.3d 98, 110, 95 Cal.Rptr. 516, 485 P.2d 1132.) In Turner v. Louisiana (1965) 379 U.S. 466, 85 S.Ct. 546, 13 L.Ed.2d 424, two deputy sheriffs who were important prosecution witnesses were also placed in charge of the sequestered jury throughout a...

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