There was one straight grant at yesterday’s Supreme Court’s conference, yet another with just six justices participating because of the court’s almost-eight-month-long vacancy, a situation that might continue for quite a while.
Separate concurring statement: probation condition
See: Separate concurrence in probation-condition review denial.
Review granted: appealability
The court agreed to hear a case raising an appellate procedure question. The issue in Lencioni v. Cutrer, as summarized by court staff (see here), is: “Is the denial of permanent injunctive relief appealable under Code of Civil Procedure section 904.1, subdivision (a)(6)?”
The superior court ruling in issue was the denial of a petition for a writ of mandate to stop a state university from discontinuing 23 academic programs and eliminating its NCAA Division II athletics program at the end of the 2024-2025 academic year. Section 904.1(a)(6) makes appealable “an order granting or dissolving an injunction, or refusing to grant or dissolve an injunction.”
In an unpublished opinion, the First District, Division Five, Court of Appeal dismissed an appeal, holding, “there is no statutory basis for an appeal, as there is no final judgment in the case, and we therefore lack jurisdiction.” The “judgment is not final,” Division Five said, “because Lencioni’s non-writ causes of action remain unresolved and awaiting judgment.”
Depublication: murders conviction reversal
There was no petition for review, but two district attorneys and the Attorney General submitted requests to depublish the Second District, Division Seven, opinion in People v. Tzul, requests the Supreme Court granted.
Division Seven reversed a conviction for first and second degree murders because the superior court had excluded a crime-scene note written by the defendant, but later admitted it when, according to the opinion, the defendant “was forced to testify to get the note into evidence.” The trial court didn’t want the jury to hear about the note, which included evidence of provocation (the defendant thought the victims, his girlfriend and her brother, were having sex), “without being subject to cross-examination, without being tested, without being in any way questioned.”
The appellate court held, “had the trial court admitted the note in the People’s case and not required Tzul to testify to get the note into evidence, it is reasonably probable Tzul would not have been convicted of first degree murder or even second degree murder.”
OSC: sentence enhancement; conceded ineffective counsel
The court issued an order to show cause, returnable in the superior court, on the habeas corpus petition filed in In re Torrez. The petition follows the Fifth District’s July 2025 summary denial of a habeas petition that was pending for over a year. The Supreme Court petition was filed 18 days after the Court of Appeal denial and was pending for an additional 11 months.
The petition challenges a sentence enhancement for a prior serious or violent felony conviction because of a lack of evidence that the defendant was, as required by Penal Code section 667(d)(3)(A), “16 years of age or older at the time the juvenile committed the prior offense.” The petition also claims the defendant’s former appellate counsel was ineffective in not raising the lack-of-evidence issue, a contention supported by the former attorney’s declaration that he had “no tactical reason for failing to challenge the prior conviction allegation.”
The Supreme Court filings are here, here, here, here, and here.
Dissenting vote: employee COVID vaccine exemption
Over Justice Groban’s recorded dissent, the court denied review in Community Hospital of the Monterey Peninsula v. Superior Court. The Sixth District had, by a 2-1 vote, summarily denied a writ petition filed after the defendant hospital’s unsuccessful summary judgment motion.
The hospital sought to defeat a lawsuit alleging a failure to accommodate employees’ religious objections to a mandatory COVID-19 vaccination policy during the pandemic.
The Supreme Court filings are here, here, and here.
Dissenting votes: murder conviction, substantial evidence
The court denied review in In re Z.F., but Justices Liu and Evans recorded votes to hear the case. A 2-1 unpublished Third District opinion affirmed a juvenile court finding the defendant had committed murder, rejecting an argument that the finding was unsupported by substantial evidence.
The majority concluded, “While this was a highly contested case, we agree with the People that a reasonable trier of fact could find” the defendant was one of two people who fatally shot the victim. The dissenting justice asserted that, “even under our deferential standard of review,” the juvenile court’s finding “on the purely circumstantial evidence here rests on surmise, not on inferences that can reasonably be drawn from the evidence.”
Dissenting vote: juvenile de facto LWOP resentencing
Justice Liu also dissented from the denial of review in People v. Redix. In an unpublished opinion, the Second District, Division Seven, affirmed the denial of a resentencing petition by the defendant who was sentenced to 40 years to life for “robbery, forcible rape, and other sex crimes that he committed when he was 17 years old.” The defendant was not arrested until almost 10 years, and was not sentenced until 14 years, after his crimes.
The defendant sought relief under Penal Code section 1170, which generally permits resentencing of some defendants who were sentenced to life without parole for crimes committed when they were minors, and under the Fourth District, Division One, decision in People v. Heard (2022) 83 Cal.App.5th 608, which held that, consistent with equal protection principles, resentencing must also be allowed for those sentenced to the “functional equivalent of life without parole.”
Division Seven held the defendant had not been sentenced to an LWOP-equivalent term. It concluded, “The lengthy period of time that elapsed before Redix was brought to justice does not convert his 40-year determinate sentence into the functional equivalent of LWOP.”
The Supreme Court last year granted review in People v. Munoz to decide whether a juvenile homicide offender sentenced to 50 years to life in prison is entitled to recall and resentencing under section 1170(d)(1), on the ground that the sentence is the functional equivalent of life imprisonment without parole. (See here; see also here.)
50 years to life sentences are getting the court’s attention; lesser, but still very lengthy, sentences, not so much. (See here.)
The Redix denial of review is “without prejudice to any relief to which defendant might be entitled after this court decides . . . Munoz.” Justice Liu — and Justice Evans — have dissented in similar cases. (See recently here.)
Criminal case grant-and-holds
There were three criminal case grant-and-holds: one more waiting for a decision in People v. Dixon (see here) and two more on hold for People v. Eaton (see here).
