People v. Shabazz

• Decision Date: 27 March 2006
• Docket Number: No. S131048.,S131048.
• Citation: 38 Cal.4th 55,40 Cal.Rptr.3d 750,130 P.3d 519
• Court: California Supreme Court
• Parties: The PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. Samuel Sharad SHABAZZ, Defendant and Appellant.

40 Cal.Rptr.3d 750

38 Cal.4th 55

130 P.3d 519

The PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. Samuel Sharad SHABAZZ, Defendant and Appellant.

No. S131048.

Supreme Court of California.

March 27, 2006.

Christine Vento, under appointment by the Supreme Court, Los Angeles, for Defendant and Appellant.

Bill Lockyer, Attorney General, Robert R. Anderson, Chief Assistant Attorney General, Pamela C. Hamanaka, Assistant Attorney General, William T. Harter, Donald E. De Nicola, Jaime L. Fuster, Kristofer Jorsad and Linda C. Johnson, Deputy Attorneys General, for Plaintiff and Respondent.

David R. LaBahn; Bonnie M. Dumanis, District Attorney (San Diego), Charles E. Nickel and James E. Atkins, Deputy District Attorneys, for California District Attorneys Association as Amicus Curiae on behalf of Plaintiff and Respondent.

GEORGE, C.J.

We granted review in this case to address the following two questions: (1) Does the special circumstance set forth in Penal Code section 190.2, subdivision (a)(22) (hereafter section 190.2(a)(22)),¹ which authorizes imposition of a punishment of death or life imprisonment without the possibility of parole upon an active participant of a criminal street gang who "intentionally killed the victim" to further the activities of the gang, apply to a defendant who discharged a firearm with the intent to kill one person but missed the intended victim and killed another individual? (2) Is a defendant who is sentenced to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole for first degree murder also subject to a sentence enhancement of 25 years to life under section 12022.53, subdivision (d) (hereafter section 12022.53(d)), for personally discharging a firearm and causing death in the commission of the murder, or does section 12022.53, subdivision (j) (hereafter section 12022.53(j)), preclude imposition of that enhancement in view of the lengthier term of incarceration—that is, life imprisonment without the possibility of parole—imposed upon the defendant for the underlying felony?

As we shall explain, we conclude that a finding of the special circumstance set forth in section 190.2(a)(22) may be upheld when a defendant, while an active participant in a criminal street gang and in furtherance of that gang's activities, has performed an act with an intent to kill that resulted in the killing of any individual. We therefore affirm the part of the Court of Appeal's judgment that so held.

With regard to the sentence enhancement of 25 years to life embodied in section 12022.53(d), we are of the view that the enhancement may be imposed notwithstanding the circumstance that defendant's sentence for the underlying felony is life imprisonment without the possibility of parole. To hold otherwise would contravene both the plain language and the legislative intent underlying section 12022.53 as a whole, and would exempt more serious offenders from a punishment imposed upon less serious offenders. We therefore reverse the part of the Court of Appeal's judgment that held to the contrary, and remand the matter to that court for proceedings consistent with the views expressed in our opinion.

I.

The relevant facts are as follows.

On May 28, 2000, in the early evening, victim Lori Gonzalez, 20 years of age, sat in the driver's seat of a blue Chevrolet Caprice that was stopped in the drive-through lane at a Popeye's Chicken and Biscuits restaurant, located at La Brea Avenue and Jefferson Street in Los Angeles.

Darrell Miller, who testified under a grant of immunity and in exchange for a reduction of his prison sentence in connection with several other unrelated felonies, was a member of the Geer Street Crips gang. He observed the blue Caprice at the restaurant. He thereafter drove to West Boulevard and Adams Street to sell drugs. Having received a cellular telephone call from an acquaintance indicating that members of the rival Bloods gang had used the blue Caprice in a recent drive-by shooting, Miller passed this information on to several other members of the Crips, including defendant, a member of the West Boulevard Crips. These individuals then drove to the restaurant.

Defendant donned gloves and a beanie, exited from Miller's vehicle, walked up to the passenger side of the blue Caprice, and fired repeatedly at Gonzalez's passenger, Ernest Gray, a member of the rival Black P-Stone Bloods gang. Gray ducked when he saw the firearm, and the shots hit and killed Gonzalez.²

A jury convicted defendant of first degree murder and found true the special circumstance that defendant intentionally killed Gonzalez while he was an active participant in a criminal street gang and that the murder was carried out to further the activities of the gang. (§ 190.2(a)(22).) The jury further found that, in committing the murder, defendant personally and intentionally discharged a firearm, thereby causing Gonzalez's death within the meaning of section 12022.53(d). The trial court thereafter sentenced defendant to life in prison without the possibility of parole for the murder of Gonzalez, plus 25 years to life in prison for the enhancement based on defendant's use of a firearm in the commission of the murder.³

On appeal, defendant contended that the criminal-street-gang special circumstance set forth in section 190.2(a)(22) does not apply to him, because that provision requires that defendant "intentionally killed the victim" and defendant intended to kill Ernest Gray, not the actual victim, Lori Gonzalez. In rejecting defendant's position, the Court of Appeal held: "[T]he section 190.2(a)(22) special circumstance requires that the defendant (1) possessed the intent to kill, (2) was an active participant in a criminal street gang, and (3) carried out the murder in furtherance of the gang's activities. There is no requirement that the person who was murdered be the person whom the defendant intended to kill." The Court of Appeal therefore concluded that the jury's true finding as to the special circumstance was appropriate as to the murder of Gonzalez.

With regard to the firearm-use enhancement set forth in section 12022.53(d), defendant contended that imposition of the 25-year-to-life enhancement was not authorized by the language of section 12022.53(j). Specifically, defendant asserted that because the sentence — life imprisonment without the possibility of parole — imposed upon him for the underlying felony, was a "longer term of imprisonment" than the prescribed 25-year-to-life enhancement, section 12022.53(j) precluded imposition of the enhancement. The Court of Appeal agreed and ordered the enhancement stricken, expressly disagreeing with the decision rendered by the Court of Appeal in People v. Chiu (2003) 113 Cal.App.4th 1260, 7 Cal.Rptr.3d 193 (Chiu), which held that a section 12022.53 enhancement properly may be imposed under such circumstances. (See also People v. Coker (2004) 120 Cal.App.4th 581, 589-590, 15 Cal.Rptr.3d 553 (Coker) [reaching a conclusion consistent with Chiu]; People v. Bracamonte (2003) 106 Cal.App.4th 704, 131 Cal.Rptr.2d 334 [although the Court of Appeal did not discuss section 12022.53(j), it upheld a 25-year-to-life enhancement under section 12022.53(d) in addition to a sentence of life imprisonment without the possibility of parole].)

Defendant and the People each sought review. We granted both petitions and limited the issues to be briefed and argued to the two issues set forth above. We turn first to the proper interpretation of the special circumstance set forth in section 190.2(a)(22).

II.

As noted, defendant was charged with and convicted of the first degree murder of Lori Gonzalez, and the jury found true the allegation that the offense met the requirements of the gang-murder special circumstance. (§ 190.2(a)(22).) Section 190.2(a)(22) provides: "The penalty for a defendant who is found guilty of murder in the first degree is death or imprisonment in the state prison for life without the possibility of parole if one or more of the following special circumstances has been found under section 190.4 to be true: [¶] ... [¶] (22) The defendant intentionally killed the victim while the defendant was an active participant in a criminal street gang, as defined in subdivision (f) of section 186.22, and the murder was carried out to further the activities of the criminal street gang."⁴

Defendant contends the gang-murder special circumstance set forth in section 190.2(a)(22) is inapplicable to him because that provision requires that he "intentionally killed the victim," and defendant intended to kill Ernest Gray, not the actual victim, Gonzalez. As we shall explain, we reject defendant's argument because it improperly minimizes the significance of the circumstance that the provisions of section 190.2(a)(22) were drafted, adopted, and reasonably must be interpreted against the background of the transferred intent doctrine, a theory of liability that long has been part of California law and one that "connotes a policy — that a defendant who shoots at an intended victim with intent to kill but misses and hits a bystander instead should be subject to the same criminal liability that would have been imposed had he hit his intended mark." (People v. Scott (1996) 14 Cal.4th 544, 551, 59 Cal.Rptr.2d 178, 927 P.2d 288 (Scott); see also People v. Suesser (1904) 142 Cal. 354, 365-367, 75 P. 1093 [interpreting California's murder statute as embodying the transferred intent doctrine].)

"Under the classic formulation of California's common law doctrine of transferred intent, a defendant who shoots with the intent to kill a certain person and hits a bystander instead is subject to the same criminal liability that would have been imposed had `"the fatal blow reached the person for whom intended."' [Citation.] In such a factual setting, the defendant is deemed as culpable as if he had accomplished what he set out to do." (Scott, supra, 14 Cal.4th at p. 546, 59 Cal.Rptr.2d 178, 927 P.2d 288 [where defendants...