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California Criminal Procedure
Venue

1. Crime Committed in Several Counties

The SUPREME COURT OF CALIFORNIA stated:

        "Penal Code section 784.7[1] permits the trial of more than one of several offenses enumerated therein in any county in which one such offense occurred if the defendant and victim are the same in all of the charged offenses.  It thus creates a venue for trial of some offenses in a county other than that in which those offenses occurred.  As a result the jury will not be selected from residents of that county. The Sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution guarantees criminal defendants the right to be tried “by an impartial jury of the state and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law.”  Article I, section 16 of the California Constitution (hereafter, article I, section 16) has been construed as implicitly reserving a similar, but not necessarily coextensive, vicinage right.

        The Court of Appeal rejected petitioner’s argument that section 784.7 is invalid because it denies defendants the right to trial by a jury drawn from residents of the area in which the charged offense allegedly was committed.  We granted review to consider whether trial in a venue authorized by section 784.7 violates either the vicinage clause of the Sixth Amendment or article I, section 16. We conclude it does not, reject other claims made by petitioner, and affirm the judgment of the Court of Appeal.

I

Background

Petitioner Shawn Garfield Price is charged in a fourth amended felony complaint filed on July 20, 1999, in the Riverside County Superior Court with:  count 1 – the April 1, 1998, murder (§ 187) of his son Sterling Price in Riverside County; count 2 – child endangerment (§ 273a, subd. (a)) involving Sterling on April 1, 1998, in Riverside County; count 3 – torture (§ 206) of his daughter Brooke on April 1, 1998, in Riverside County; count 4 – child endangerment involving Brooke from December 1, 1996 through April 1, 1998, in Riverside County; and count 5 – child endangerment involving Brooke on April 20, 1995, in Santa Clara County.  Petitioner’s wife, Julia Ellen Price, is a named defendant in counts 2, 3, and 4.  Infliction of great bodily harm (§§ 12022.7, subd. (a), 1192.7, subd. (c)(8)), is charged in connection with counts 4 and 5.  Sterling and Brooke were ages two and three years, respectively, on April 1, 1998.

The Santa Clara County offense (count 5 above) was originally charged in a felony complaint filed on April 15, 1998, in the Municipal Court of the Santa Clara County Judicial District.  Thereafter, a felony complaint filed in the Riverside County Superior Court on March 1, 1999, charged petitioner with the four Riverside County offenses.  On March 5, 1999, the Riverside County prosecutor moved to consolidate the Santa Clara County case with the Riverside County prosecution pursuant to section 784.7.  Petitioner opposed the consolidation on the ground that it violated his right to trial in the vicinage as guaranteed by the Sixth Amendment and corresponding implied right under article I, section 16.  On March 23, 1999, the court ordered the transfer and consolidation of the Santa Clara County case with the Riverside County case.  A third amended felony complaint was filed on the same day charging petitioner with the Santa Clara County offense as well as the original Riverside County charges.  Petitioner then sought relief by petition for writ of mandate/prohibition, the Court of Appeal issued an order to show cause, and, after briefing and argument,[2] discharged the order to show cause and denied the petition.[3]

The Court of Appeal first rejected petitioner’s claims that the consolidation procedure violated section 954, which permits joinder of offenses in specified circumstances; that the procedure would deprive petitioner of a fair trial; that venue was not proper in Riverside County; and that application of section 784.7 was an impermissible ex post facto application of that section.  The Court of Appeal then addressed and rejected petitioner’s vicinage argument.  The court reasoned that in section 784.7 the Legislature had created a flexible multicounty district for trial of the enumerated offenses by expanding the venue for trial to include a county in which a related offense was committed.  That district did not offend the federal or state constitutional guarantees of trial in the vicinage in which the offense is committed.  The court relied in part for that conclusion on People v. Martin (1995) 38 Cal.App.4th 883, 888, where the court had held that the counties in which venue lies under the venue statutes comprise a district for vicinage purposes, and Hernandez v. Municipal Court (1989) 49 Cal.3d 713 (Hernandez), in which this court suggested that a narrow interpretation of the vicinage requirement is no longer warranted.

The Court of Appeal reasoned that the contemporary right to trial by jury no longer contemplates jurors who are familiar with the parties and the locality and therefore are able to supply their own personal knowledge in evaluating the evidence.  That common law concept has been replaced with a right to trial by jurors who do not have independent knowledge of those factors.  In People v. Richardson (1934) 138 Cal.App. 404, 407 (Richardson), the court held that the right to a jury of the vicinage was satisfied by a jury drawn from the county in which the trial is authorized by law to be held.  People v. Powell (1891) 87 Cal. 348, 354-360 (Powell), which interpreted vicinage as the county in which the offense occurred, had been criticized, and this court’s decision in People v. Prather (1901) 134 Cal. 386, 389-390 upholding trial of theft-related offenses in either the county in which the theft occurred or that to which the property was taken, cast doubt on Powell. 

The Court of Appeal here recognized that, unlike the cases in which venue is proper in any county in which an act related to the charged offense occurs, section 784.7 requires only that the victim and defendant in a spousal or child abuse charge arising in a different county be the same as those named in a charge pending in the county where trial is to be held.  Nonetheless, this relationship was sufficient to satisfy the venue requirement of article I, section 16.[4]  Given the cost of multiple trials, the state had a significant interest in allowing joinder for trial of charges related in this way, whereas the importance of trial by members of the community in which an offense occurs was rapidly diminishing.[5]

Petitioner now repeats his contentions that section 784.7 violates state and federal vicinage rights; violates venue requirements by permitting a case with no factual nexus to Riverside County to be tried there; and does not permit consolidation of the Santa Clara County offenses with offenses committed in Riverside County against a separate victim (Sterling).
To See complete Opinion Click: SUPREME COURT OF CALIFORNIA, S085852, SHAWN GARFIELD PRICE,      v. THE SUPERIOR COURT OF  RIVERSIDE COUNTY,        mmm   

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