People v. Ramirez CA4/1
- Proceeding
- appeal from an order
- Trial court
- Superior Court of San Diego County · No. SCD138947
- Trial judge
- John M. Thompson
- Outcome
- reversed — Reversed.
- Area
- criminal
- Panel
- William S. Dato (author), Laurence D. Rubin, Julia C. Kelety
Analysis
The trial court denied Ramirez’s second petition for resentencing under Penal Code section 1172.6 without an evidentiary hearing, relying on the preclusive effect of a prior denial and the judge’s belief that the verdict established personal premeditated killing. The Court of Appeal reversed, accepting the Attorney General’s concession that changes in the law precluded collateral estoppel and that the record did not conclusively establish ineligibility for relief.
| Ruling reviewed | Standard | The court | The model |
|---|---|---|---|
Denial of the second petition for resentencing under Penal Code section 1172.6 at the prima facie stage without an evidentiary hearing.“The order is reversed, and the matter is remanded for further proceedings on Ramirez’s petition.” | unclear | error | agree with court The appellate court accepted the Attorney General’s concession that the trial court erred by applying collateral estoppel from the first petition despite intervening statutory and case law changes, and by failing to recognize that the record did not conclusively establish the defendant’s ineligibility for relief as a matter of law. |
Authorities
- relied: People v. Jimenez (2024) 103 Cal.App.5th 994 — Changes in statutory and decisional law after the denial of a first resentencing petition dictate that the first denial not be accorded preclusive effect to a second petition.
- relied: People v. Harden (2022) 81 Cal.App.5th 45 — A jury’s verdict does not conclusively establish a defendant’s ineligibility for relief as a matter of law if the record does not foreclose the possibility of conviction under a now-invalid theory.
- relied: People v. Lewis (2021) 11 Cal.5th 952 — At the prima facie stage of a section 1172.6 petition, a trial court should not engage in factfinding involving the weighing of evidence or the exercise of discretion.
- relied: People v. Estrada (2024) 101 Cal.App.5th 328 — The fact that a defendant is the only one charged does not establish their ineligibility for resentencing relief as a matter of law.
The appellate opinion: sound — The opinion is sound because it correctly applies the standard for the prima facie stage of a section 1172.6 petition, recognizing that the trial court cannot weigh evidence or exercise discretion to deny relief when the record does not conclusively establish ineligibility. It appropriately accepts the Attorney General’s concession that intervening legal changes precluded the application of collateral estoppel from the prior denial.
How this analysis was made · dispute it
unusual dispositionThe superior court denied Raul Ramirez's second Penal Code section 1172.6 resentencing petition at the prima facie stage without an evidentiary hearing, reasoning that no intervening change in law undermined the denial of his first petition and that the verdict established he personally killed the victim with premeditation. The Court of Appeal accepted the Attorney General's concession of error, held the second petition was not barred by collateral estoppel because of intervening statutory and decisional changes and that the record did not conclusively foreclose a felony-murder aiding-and-abetting theory, and reversed and remanded for further proceedings.
| Ruling reviewed | Standard | The court | The model |
|---|---|---|---|
Denial of the second section 1172.6 petition on the ground that the denial of the first petition had preclusive effect because there were no intervening changes in the law“because there were several applicable changes to the law since the denial of appellant’s first petition, the second petition was not barred under principles of collateral estoppel.” | unclear | error (law misapplied) | agree with court The opinion does not articulate a standard of review, though prima facie denials under section 1172.6 are ordinarily reviewed de novo. Between the first denial (affirmed in 2021) and the second petition, section 1172.6, subdivision (d)(3) was amended to limit use of prior appellate opinions to procedural history and to provide that substantial evidence is insufficient to prove ineligibility, and Lewis clarified that trial courts may not weigh evidence at the prima facie stage. Issue preclusion does not apply where the legal context has changed, so the trial court's reliance on the prior denial was erroneous; the Attorney General's concession and Jimenez support this conclusion. |
Denial of the petition at the prima facie stage on the ground that the verdict established Ramirez personally killed the victim with premeditation because he was the only person charged“does not conclusively foreclose the possibility that [Ramirez] was convicted as an aider and abettor to a first degree felony murder.” | unclear | error (law misapplied) | agree with court Under Lewis a court at the prima facie stage must take the petition's allegations as true and may deny relief only if the record of conviction conclusively refutes them without factfinding or weighing evidence. The jury was instructed on aiding and abetting felony murder, and the not-true finding on the robbery-murder special circumstance did not necessarily reflect a finding that Ramirez was the actual killer or acted with premeditation. The trial court's inference that he must have been the killer because he was the only one charged is factfinding of the type Lewis forbids, and Estrada rejects that inference as a matter of law. The appellate court's conclusion is supported. |
Authorities
- relied: People v. Lewis (2021) 11 Cal.5th 952 — At the prima facie stage of a section 1172.6 petition the trial court may not engage in factfinding involving the weighing of evidence or the exercise of discretion; it may deny only if the record of conviction conclusively refutes the petitioner's allegations.
- relied: People v. Jimenez (2024) 103 Cal.App.5th 994 — Denial of a prior section 1172.6 petition does not have preclusive effect on a successive petition where intervening changes in statutory and decisional law have altered the governing legal standards.
- relied: People v. Harden (2022) 81 Cal.App.5th 45 — A jury's verdict and findings establish ineligibility for section 1172.6 relief at the prima facie stage only if they conclusively demonstrate as a matter of law that the petitioner was convicted on a still-valid theory.
- relied: People v. Estrada (2024) 101 Cal.App.5th 328 — The fact that the petitioner was the only person charged with the murder does not establish as a matter of law that he was the actual killer or is ineligible for section 1172.6 relief.
- missed: People v. Strong (2022) 13 Cal.5th 698 — Issue preclusion does not bar relitigation in section 1172.6 proceedings of findings made under legal standards that have since materially changed; an intervening change in the legal context is an exception to issue preclusion.
- missed: People v. Curiel (2023) 15 Cal.5th 433 — At the prima facie stage a trial court may give preclusive effect only to jury findings that actually and necessarily decided the facts that would establish ineligibility under current law; findings that do not resolve every element of a valid theory do not conclusively refute the petition.
The appellate opinion: sound with gaps — The memorandum opinion reaches the correct result, correctly recognizing that intervening amendments to section 1172.6 and Lewis prevent preclusive effect for the first denial and that a record showing an aiding-and-abetting felony-murder instruction does not conclusively establish ineligibility. It rests almost entirely on the Attorney General's concession, does not state a standard of review, and does not address the Supreme Court's controlling discussion of issue preclusion and jury findings in Strong and Curiel.
Opinion
Filed 2/25/26 P. v. Ramirez CA4/1 NOT TO BE PUBLISHED IN OFFICIAL REPORTS California Rules of Court, rule 8.1115(a), prohibits courts and parties from citing or relying on opinions not certified for publication or ordered published, except as specified by rule 8.1115(b). This opinion has not been certified for publication or ordered published for purposes of rule 8.1115.
COURT OF APPEAL, FOURTH APPELLATE DISTRICT
DIVISION ONE
STATE OF CALIFORNIA
THE PEOPLE, D084653
Plaintiff and Respondent, v. (Super. Ct. No. SCD138947)
RAUL ENRIQUE RAMIREZ,
Defendant and Appellant.
APPEAL from an order of the Superior Court of San Diego County, John M. Thompson, Judge. Reversed. Reed Webb, under appointment by the Court of Appeal, for Defendant and Appellant. Rob Bonta, Attorney General, Lance E. Winters, Chief Assistant Attorney General, Charles C. Ragland, Assistant Attorney General, Robin Urbanski, Seth M. Friedman and Juliet W. Part, for Plaintiff and Respondent. MEMORANDUM OPINION A. Factual and Procedural Background Early one morning in August 1998, defendant Raul Enrique Ramirez and another man were observed walking away from a burning taxicab.1 Ramirez’s hand was wrapped in a bloody cloth. After the fire was put out, a severely burned corpse was found inside the remains of the vehicle. The victim—the taxi driver—had been shot seven times, and was apparently dead before the fire began. Ramirez was arrested at a hospital later that same day after he sought treatment for burns on various parts of his body. Following a jury trial, Ramirez was convicted of first degree murder (Pen. Code,2 §§ 187, subd. (a) & 189), first degree robbery (§§ 211, 212.5), and arson (§ 451, subd. (d)). But the jurors found not true a special circumstance allegation that he committed the murder in the course of the robbery. (§ 190.2, subd. (a)(17).) In 2020, Ramirez filed a petition for resentencing under then-section 1170.95 (now § 1172.6), asserting that he had been found guilty of murder based on a now-invalid theory and could no longer be convicted due to recent statutory changes. The superior court denied the petition at the prima facie stage without an evidentiary hearing, concluding there was “sufficient evidence to establish Petitioner acted with premeditation and deliberation when he committed the murder.” This court affirmed in an unpublished opinion. (Ramirez, supra, D034781.)
1 This rudimentary statement of the facts is taken from our unpublished opinion in the direct appeal (People v. Ramirez (July 8, 2021, D078364) (Ramirez)) and is provided only for context. 2 All statutory references are to the Penal Code. 2 Three years later, Ramirez filed a second petition for resentencing under section 1172.6, again asserting that he could not presently be convicted of murder because of changes to sections 188 and 189. The same superior court judge again denied the petition without a hearing. Referring back to the first petition, the judge concluded there were “no changes in the interim in the law [that] would affect this particular case.” The judge also believed the verdict established that Ramirez “acted with premeditation in the killing of the victim.” In the judge’s view, his “liability for murder . . . could only be the result of [Ramirez] personally killing the victim since he was the only one charged . . . .”
B. Analysis Ramirez maintains that changes in statutory and decisional law after the denial of his first resentencing petition dictate that it not be accorded preclusive effect. (People v. Jimenez (2024) 103 Cal.App.5th 994, 1005.) On the merits, he argues that the jury’s verdict does not conclusively establish he is ineligible for relief as a matter of law. (People v. Harden (2022) 81 Cal.App.5th 45, 52.) Asserting that his conviction for first degree murder may have been based on the felony murder rule, he contends he has made a prima facie case for relief and is entitled to an evidentiary hearing. The Attorney General appropriately concedes error. He notes that “because there were several applicable changes to the law since the denial of appellant’s first petition, the second petition was not barred under principles of collateral estoppel.” These include amendments to the statute (§ 1172.6, subd. (d)(3)), limiting reliance on a prior appellate opinion to “the procedural history of the case” and providing that substantial evidence to support a murder conviction “is insufficient to prove, beyond a reasonable doubt, that the petitioner is ineligible for resentencing.” They also include more recent 3 Supreme Court caselaw clarifying that at the prima facie stage, a trial court “should not engage in ‘factfinding involving the weighing of evidence or the exercise of discretion.’ ” (People v. Lewis (2021) 11 Cal.5th 952, 972.) On the merits of the petition, the Attorney General agrees that the record “does not conclusively foreclose the possibility that [Ramirez] was convicted as an aider and abettor to a first degree felony murder.” He points out that Ramirez’s jury was instructed on such a theory and admits it is “possible that the jury based its murder finding on the now-precluded theory of aiding and abetting a robbery felony murder.”3 Referencing the jury’s finding that the robbery-murder special circumstance was not true, he explains it “might have reflected only that the robbery was merely incidental to the commission of the murder or that the jury was unsure about [Ramirez’s] exact role.” We agree with the Attorney General’s analysis and accept his concession of error as well taken.
DISPOSITION
The order is reversed, and the matter is remanded for further proceedings on Ramirez’s petition. DATO, Acting P. J.
WE CONCUR:
KELETY, J.
RUBIN, J.
3 Certainly the fact that Ramirez was the only one charged does not establish his ineligibility for relief as a matter of law. (See People v. Estrada (2024) 101 Cal.App.5th 328, 339.) 4
Cites, in this corpus
- People v. Lewis S260598 · 2021-07-26