California Legal Brief

The Rule of People v. Demolle is that a suspect's consent to provide a blood sample is not the product of an unlawful detention where the encounter remains consensual, under circumstances where a reasonable person would feel free to leave or terminate the encounter despite being taken to a police station and briefly held in locked interview rooms.

The Rule of People v. Chhuon and Pan is that defense counsel cannot concede a defendant's guilt to any crime over the defendant's express objection to maintain innocence, even as part of an alternative argument strategy, under circumstances where the defendant expressly instructs counsel not to admit guilt and counsel nevertheless argues the defendant is guilty of lesser charges to avoid the death penalty.

The Rule of People v. Barrera is that evidence of prolonged physical abuse, deliberate starvation, isolation, and refusal to seek medical care can support convictions for first degree murder by torture and premeditated/deliberate murder of children, under circumstances involving systematic abuse causing multiple injuries over time combined with fatal acts against severely weakened victims.

The Rule of People v. Bankston is that penalty phase proceedings in capital cases that are marked by errors under the California Racial Justice Act of 2020 (Penal Code section 745, subdivision (a)) require reversal of the death judgment, under circumstances where both prosecution and defense agree such errors occurred.

The Rule of People v. Stayner is that a defendant's statement "I prefer not to talk now" during a Miranda advisement does not constitute an unambiguous invocation of Miranda rights when the defendant subsequently agrees to be interviewed at a different location, under circumstances where the defendant was told he was not under arrest, voluntarily agreed to travel with FBI agents, and later voluntarily waived his Miranda rights and signed a waiver form before making any incriminating statements.

The Rule of People v. Bertsch and Hronis is that a defendant's extreme religious beliefs alone do not render him mentally incompetent under Penal Code section 1367 if he is unwilling, rather than unable, to cooperate with counsel, under circumstances where the defendant understands the proceedings and can rationally assist in his defense despite his religious convictions.

The Rule of The People v. The Superior Court of Riverside County is that a former prosecutor must be disqualified from presiding over a Racial Justice Act evidentiary hearing when they were directly involved in making charging decisions and present at staffing meetings where homicide filing decisions were made during the relevant time period being analyzed for institutional bias, under circumstances where the judge's personal involvement in the decision-making process being scrutinized might cause an objective observer to reasonably doubt the judge's impartiality.