The Supreme Court yesterday declined to hear People v. Ambriz. There were no recorded dissents, but three justices issued a concurring statement saying the petition for review “has raised an important legal question,” one about mandatory versus directory statutory deadlines.
The defendant was resentenced under Penal Code section 1172.75 after the superior court did not continue the hearing beyond a date by which the statute said the resentencing “shall be completed.” The Second District, Division Four, Court of Appeal, in an unpublished opinion rejected the defendant’s contentions that the continuance denial was erroneous and that he was denied the effective assistance of counsel. Division Four said the trial court had not abused its discretion because it had “offered defense counsel a shorter continuance than counsel requested, which counsel declined.”
Justice Goodwin Liu, in a separate statement joined by Justices Joshua Groban and Kelli Evans, wrote that he agreed with the review denial “[o]n this record” and said “nothing appears to preclude him from developing the factual record through a writ of habeas corpus and then seeking relief for ineffective assistance of counsel.”
The “important legal question” Justice Liu identified was “whether trial courts may resentence defendants after the [statutory] deadline.” “We have long observed that failure to follow statutory procedures does not necessarily invalidate a subsequent governmental action,” the concurrence states, and it concludes, “Whether the deadlines in section 1172.75, subdivision (c) are . . . directory rather than mandatory is an important question that may call for our attention in a future case.”
