The California Supreme Court affirms a death sentence for the 1999 rape-murder of an Oakland 11-year-old, holding that a suspect who voluntarily accompanies police to the station and is briefly placed in a lockable interview room has not been seized under the Fourth Amendment — and clarifying when v
The California Supreme Court affirms a double gang-murder defendant’s convictions but reverses his 1994 death sentence under the retroactive California Racial Justice Act of 2020, requiring a new penalty-phase trial in a case that has been on automatic appeal for over three decades.
The California Supreme Court unanimously affirmed the death sentence of a Los Angeles father convicted of the torture-murders of two young children, holding that months of deliberate beatings, starvation, and medical neglect provided sufficient evidence of premeditated torturous intent, and that con
The California Supreme Court reverses a death-row defendant’s convictions entirely because his attorney conceded guilt over the client’s explicit objection — a structural constitutional error requiring automatic reversal — while affirming the co-defendant’s death sentence and vacat
The California Supreme Court unanimously held that defendants who accepted upper term sentences as part of a plea bargain may seek retroactive benefit of SB 567’s amendments to Penal Code section 1170(b), but the remedy is a remand for the defendant to waive, renegotiate, or withdraw the plea—not an
On automatic appeal, the California Supreme Court unanimously affirms the convictions and death sentence of Cary Stayner for the 1999 Cedar Lodge murders of Carole Sund, her daughter Juli, and Silvina Pelosso. Justice Evans concurred and dissented in part.
The California Supreme Court affirms the convictions and Bertsch’s death sentence in this 1985 kidnap-rape-murder case but reverses Hronis’s death sentence because of post-trial changes in the law governing a defendant’s mental competency to represent himself.
The California Supreme Court reverses Omar Deen’s capital conviction and death sentence because the trial court failed to adequately examine whether a juror who had a personal connection to the murdered police chief harbored actual bias.
The California Supreme Court holds that assault is not a lesser included offense of resisting an officer by force or violence under Penal Code section 69, because resistance does not require the present ability to inflict harm.
The California Supreme Court holds that a small amount of loose marijuana scattered on a car floor is not an open container under state law and does not give police probable cause to search the vehicle.