People v. Santamaria

Decision Date12 April 1991
Docket NumberA050223,Nos. A045715,s. A045715
Citation280 Cal.Rptr. 43,229 Cal.App.3d 269
CourtCalifornia Court of Appeals Court of Appeals
PartiesThe PEOPLE of the State of California, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. Jose Napoleon SANTAMARIA, Defendant and Appellant. In re Jose Napoleon SANTAMARIA on Habeas Corpus.

Lawrence A. Gibbs, Berkeley (Under appointment of the Court of Appeal), for defendant and appellant.

Daniel E. Lungren, John K. Van de Kamp, Atty. Gen., Richard B. Iglehart, Chief Asst. Atty. Gen., John H. Sugiyama, Sr. Asst. Atty. Gen., Herbert F. Wilkinson, Supervising Deputy Atty. Gen., Jeremy Friedlander, Deputy Atty. Gen., San Francisco, for plaintiff and respondent.

STRANKMAN, Associate Justice.

Appellant Jose Napoleon Santamaria was convicted by a jury of first degree murder and robbery. (Pen.Code, §§ 187, 211.) 1 The jury found a robbery-murder special circumstance allegation to be true (§ 190.2, subd. (a)(17)(i)); it also found not true a personal knife use enhancement allegation (§ 12022, subd. (b)). Appellant has appealed from the judgment and has also filed a petition for writ of habeas corpus which has been consolidated with the appeal.

We have concluded that the trial court committed reversible error when it adjourned jury deliberations for 11 days without good cause, despite both the availability of an alternative to interrupting the deliberations and the prejudice to appellant inherent in the timing and duration of the adjournment in this particular case. Because we reverse the judgment, we dismiss the habeas petition as moot.

I. Evidence at Trial

On August 31, 1985, Victor Guadron withdrew about $1,500 from the bank, in preparation for an upcoming trip to El Salvador; he displayed the cash to several people.

Guadron never took his trip. Only a few days later, at about 2 p.m. on September 5, his body was discovered in Moss Beach. He had been stabbed several times; tire marks on his body indicated that he had also been run over more than once. His neck was discolored and his larynx broken, an injury commonly seen in strangulation cases. Light bands of skin color on his wrist and fingers suggested that he had been wearing rings, a watch, and perhaps a bracelet, all of which had been removed. His blood alcohol level when he died was .33 percent.

The circumstances of Guadron's death were described by Anthony Nubla, who had previously pled guilty to being an accessory to the murder and agreed to cooperate with the prosecution. During the summer of 1985, Nubla had worked at Thrifty Rent-A-Car in San Francisco with appellant, who was Guadron's distant cousin.

On the morning of September 5, appellant telephoned Nubla and promised to pay a $200 debt if Nubla would pick up appellant and Guadron, whom appellant called his "uncle." When Nubla picked up the two men, Guadron sat in the front passenger seat; appellant sat behind him. Appellant directed Nubla to the Pacific Bell office; Nubla double-parked and Guadron went in to pay his phone bill. While Guadron was inside, appellant said he was going to kill Guadron, but Nubla did not think appellant was serious.

After Guadron returned to the car, Nubla drove to Dolores Park to buy marijuana. When they got to the park, Nubla parked, left the car, and headed toward a few marijuana dealers, the only people he saw in the park. He heard someone yelling "Help" in English. He turned around and saw appellant hugging the neck of Guadron and stabbing him.

Nubla ran back toward the car and asked, "what's wrong, what's wrong?" Appellant replied, "let's drive, let's drive, let's go." Nubla was planning to take Guadron to the hospital but appellant directed him down the highway toward Pacifica. As they drove, appellant tilted Guadron's seat so that he was lying down flat; appellant also took Guadron's jewelry and his money. Eventually appellant had Nubla stop; with Nubla's help, appellant pulled Guadron out of the car. Appellant then took the wheel and drove over Guadron's body two times, saying, "I am sorry, uncle."

Appellant and Nubla returned to appellant's house, where they cleaned the blood from Nubla's car; appellant gave Nubla $200 of Guadron's money. About a week later, appellant came to Nubla's house and asked to borrow his license, because appellant wanted to pawn the jewelry, but Nubla refused. Nevertheless, Nubla went with appellant to a pawnshop where no agreement was reached about price. Then they went to the house of Nubla's friend, Danny Fiel. While appellant waited in the car, Nubla tried to sell the jewelry to Fiel, but he did not have any money.

Nubla then offered Danny's brother, Bert Fiel, $20 to help him and appellant pawn the jewelry. Nubla testified that he and appellant picked up Bert and went to two pawnshops; eventually they pawned the jewelry with Bert signing the receipt. Bert took $20; appellant took the rest. Bert testified that Nubla asked to borrow his identification for $25; using Bert's identification, they pawned the jewelry for about $175. Although Nubla testified that he told Bert that there was a murder "involved [on]" the jewelry, Bert testified that he was told nothing about the killing before the jewelry was pawned; he claimed he did not ask why Nubla was selling the jewelry or where it came from.

In May 1987, police had Nubla arrange to meet appellant. They told him what to say and equipped him with a transmitter. Nubla had two conversations with appellant, both of which were recorded; the tapes were played for the jury, and transcripts of the tapes were also provided. Appellant did not explicitly admit his involvement in the murder during these conversations, but they were incriminating nonetheless. For example, during one conversation, Nubla said, "Man, you the one who did it, bro...." The transcript indicates that appellant replied, "Shhhh, Shhh...." 2 Appellant also told Nubla how to get out of the country; when Nubla insisted that he needed $100, appellant said, "Week, man. Hey."

Appellant's defense was alibi. At about 1 p.m. on September 5, appellant drove a friend to her work to pick up a paycheck. They came back to her home, and appellant spent the rest of the day watching television and drinking beer. The next day, appellant heard from his grandmother that Guadron was dead.

Appellant claimed that Nubla borrowed appellant's car for a couple of hours on September 13. Eventually, Nubla told appellant that he had used the car to take a man named Bert to a pawnshop, so Bert could sell some jewelry he had obtained from a robbery. Appellant knew about Bert, because on September 12, Bert had tried to sell him some jewelry, which appellant recognized as Guadron's. Appellant denied ever having Guadron's jewelry or trying to pawn it; he said he loved Guadron, and denied killing him.

II. Adjournment of Jury Deliberations

We first consider appellant's contention that the trial court committed prejudicial error when it suspended jury deliberations for 11 days.

a. Procedural Background

Jury deliberations began on the 14th day of trial, February 9, 1989, at 4:19 p.m.; at 4:32 p.m., the proceedings were adjourned for the day. The jury deliberated again on February 10, but did not reach a verdict; that afternoon, the court admonished the jury not to discuss the case with anyone and adjourned for 11 days, until February 21. Deliberations resumed on that date. At 9:20 a.m. the instructions were sent to the jury at their request. Later, the jury sent a question to the court; the court and counsel conferred, and the court referred the jury to the instructions that had been provided. Following a brief morning recess and a lunch recess, the jury reached a verdict at approximately 2:30 p.m.

After the jury was excused, the following exchange occurred concerning the interrupted deliberations:

"[Prosecutor]: There are one or two things that I want to put on record.

"The court: Do either of you want to try to talk to the jury?

"[Defense counsel]: I prefer to have it put on the record and--

"The court: All right. Go ahead.

"[Prosecutor]: I wanted to place on the record, Your Honor, my recollection of a discussion that we had a week ago Friday in chambers and [defense counsel]. I am sure he will correct me if my recollection is not correct, but just for purposes of the record, we had a discussion in chambers a week ago this past Friday ... February the 10th and we had a discussion about the fact Your Honor was to be away this past week. My recollection is that I made a suggestion that we have another judge preside over the jury deliberations during Your Honor's absence, and that [defense counsel] did not expressly state a position on it, but indicated that he believed it might be inappropriate to have another judge preside over the jury deliberations in Your Honor's absence. And at any rate, Your Honor made the decision that the deliberations would be recessed. That is my recollection of the discussion.

"[Defense counsel]: I don't believe I made any comment about the inappropriateness of anything. I think the only thing I mentioned was the existence of section 1053 of the Penal Code which seems to apply to such a matter.

"The court: I had indicated when the jury was being selected, I had indicated to them that they would be off that [particular] week, that being the week of the 13th of February. And that they could count on that as one of the times that [we] would not be in session. [p] I had also checked with one of the alternate jurors that particular day to see if he recalled that and he vividly recalled it. [p] I also had received a note from the jury asking me if they'd be off that week also prior to meeting with counsel in chambers. [p] And they were aware obviously of the indication and I indicated to them they would be off that week and thus we were so. [p] So with that let us refer the matter to...

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  • People v. Santamaria
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    ...reversed the judgment, finding that an 11-day continuance during jury deliberations was prejudicial error. (People v. Santamaria (1991) 229 Cal.App.3d 269, 280 Cal.Rptr. 43.) On remand, the People filed a new information identical to the previous one except that it did not include the weapo......
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