Conservatorship of Richard R. CA4/1

California Court of Appeal · D063837 · 2014-01-16 · Unpublished

Proceeding: appeal from a judgment
Trial court: Superior Court of San Diego County · No. MH98305
Trial judge: Joseph P. Brannigan
Outcome: affirmed — Affirmed.
Area: other
Panel: Gilbert Nares (author), Richard D. Huffman, Sr., Joan K. Irion

Analysis

A model's reading — qwen3.8-27b, prompt v1, 2026-10-13T06:46Z · confidence high

The trial court denied Richard R.'s request to appear in person at his conservatorship reestablishment hearing, allowing him to participate via videoconference, and subsequently reestablished the conservatorship based on overwhelming evidence of grave disability. The Court of Appeal affirmed the judgment, concluding that any error in denying physical presence was harmless under both state and federal standards.

Ruling reviewed	Standard	The court	The model
Denial of request for physical presence at conservatorship reestablishment hearing “Without deciding whether the trial court erred, we conclude that any assumed error was harmless.”	de novo	harmless error	agree with court The appellate court applied the de novo standard for statutory interpretation but declined to decide the merits of the statutory interpretation, instead applying the harmless error test. The court found that the evidence of grave disability was overwhelming and that the outcome would not have changed had the appellant been physically present. This is a standard application of the Watson harmless error doctrine in civil cases where the record is clear.
Denial of request for judicial notice of documents “Here, the record does not establish that the public conservator submitted either document in support of its briefing before the trial court.”	unclear	error	agree with court The court denied judicial notice because the documents were not part of the trial court record. This is consistent with the principle that appellate courts generally do not take judicial notice of matters not presented to the trial court, as cited in Haworth v. Superior Court.

Authorities

relied: Conservatorship of John L. (2010) 48 Cal.4th 131 — Establishes the de novo standard of review for statutory interpretation in conservatorship cases and the due process balancing test.
relied: People v. Watson (1956) 46 Cal.2d 818 — Establishes the harmless error standard for state law errors, requiring a showing that the error resulted in a miscarriage of justice.
relied: People v. Epps (2001) 25 Cal.4th 19 — Supports the application of the Watson harmless error analysis to the denial of statutory rights.
relied: D.E. v. Superior Court (2003) 111 Cal.App.4th 502 — Supports the application of the Watson harmless error analysis in the context of conservatorship proceedings.
relied: Cassim v. Allstate Ins. Co. (2004) 33 Cal.4th 780 — Reinforces the requirement that reversal is only justified when it is reasonably probable that a more favorable result would have been reached absent the error.
relied: Chapman v. California (1967) 386 U.S. 18 — Establishes the harmless beyond a reasonable doubt standard for federal constitutional errors.
relied: People v. Hurtado (2002) 28 Cal.4th 1179 — Applies the Chapman harmless beyond a reasonable doubt standard in the context of civil commitment proceedings.
relied: Haworth v. Superior Court (2010) 50 Cal.4th 372 — Supports the refusal to take judicial notice of matters not presented to the trial court.

The appellate opinion: sound — The opinion is sound because it correctly applies the de novo standard for statutory interpretation and the appropriate harmless error standards (Watson for state law, Chapman for federal constitutional law). It relies on well-established California authorities to support its conclusion that the overwhelming evidence of grave disability rendered any procedural error harmless.

How this analysis was made · dispute it

unusual disposition

A model's reading — claude-fable-5-1, prompt v1, 2026-10-13T04:31Z · confidence low

The San Diego Superior Court denied Richard R.'s request to be physically present at his LPS conservatorship reestablishment hearing, held the hearing with him appearing by videoconference from Santa Cruz, found beyond a reasonable doubt that he remained gravely disabled, and reappointed the public conservator with locked-facility placement. The Court of Appeal declined to decide whether Probate Code section 1825 or due process required his physical presence, held that any assumed statutory or constitutional error was harmless under Watson and Chapman given overwhelming evidence of grave disability, denied the conservator's request for judicial notice of documents not presented below, and affirmed.

Ruling reviewed	Standard	The court	The model
Denial of the proposed conservatee's request to be physically present at the reestablishment hearing, with appearance by videoconference instead, challenged as a violation of Probate Code section 1825, subdivision (a) “Without deciding whether the trial court erred, we conclude that any assumed error was harmless.”	de novo	harmless error	agree with court The court correctly identifies de novo review for statutory interpretation (John L.) and the Watson standard for denial of a state statutory right (Epps; D.E. v. Superior Court; Cal. Const., art. VI, § 13). The harmlessness conclusion rests on uncontradicted medical opinion from three doctors, a history of 28 hospitalizations, two recent assaults at a lower-level facility, and Richard's stated intent to stop medication; the opinion does not identify anything physical presence could have added to the proof. The court's refusal to decide the merits of the § 1825 question leaves the statutory issue unresolved, but assuming error and finding it harmless is a legitimate approach.
Denial of physical presence challenged as a violation of federal due process “In light of the overwhelming evidence at the hearing, we have no doubt the court would have reestablished conservatorship over Richard had he been physically present.”	de novo	harmless error	agree with court The court applies the John L. three-factor balancing framework and the Chapman harmless-beyond-a-reasonable-doubt standard via Hurtado, which is the accepted standard for constitutional error in civil commitment proceedings. It again declines to decide whether videoconferencing violates due process and finds any error harmless on the same overwhelming evidence. The analysis is thin in that it does not address whether denial of presence could be treated as structural rather than trial error, or whether in-person observation of Richard might have affected the court's assessment of his testimony, but on this record the conclusion is defensible and Richard offered no contradicting evidence.

Authorities

relied: People v. Watson (1956) 46 Cal.2d 818 — State-law error requires reversal only if it is reasonably probable a result more favorable to the appellant would have been reached absent the error.
relied: Conservatorship of John L. (2010) 48 Cal.4th 131 — Interpretation of Probate Code section 1825 in LPS proceedings is reviewed de novo; due process in conservatorship cases is assessed by balancing private interests, public interests, and risk of erroneous decision.
relied: People v. Epps (2001) 25 Cal.4th 19 — Denial of a purely statutory right is reviewed for prejudice under the Watson harmless error standard.
relied: D.E. v. Superior Court (2003) 111 Cal.App.4th 502 — Violation of a statutory procedural right is subject to Watson harmless error analysis.
relied: Cassim v. Allstate Ins. Co. (2004) 33 Cal.4th 780 — Under article VI, section 13 of the California Constitution, a judgment may not be reversed absent a miscarriage of justice.
relied: Chapman v. California (1967) 386 U.S. 18 — Federal constitutional error is reversible unless shown to be harmless beyond a reasonable doubt.
relied: People v. Hurtado (2002) 28 Cal.4th 1179 — Chapman harmless-beyond-a-reasonable-doubt standard applies to federal constitutional error in civil commitment proceedings.
relied: Haworth v. Superior Court (2010) 50 Cal.4th 372 — A reviewing court need not take judicial notice of matters that were not presented to the trial court.

The appellate opinion: sound with gaps — The opinion applies the correct standards of review and harmless-error tests (Watson for statutory error, Chapman for constitutional error) and the harmlessness finding is well supported by uncontradicted medical evidence, recent assaults, and the appellant's stated intent to stop medication. It leaves gaps by declining to decide whether section 1825 requires physical presence or whether videoconferencing satisfies due process, and by not explaining why in-person observation of the conservatee could not have affected the fact finder's assessment, though the result is defensible on this record.

How this analysis was made · dispute it

Opinion

Filed 1/16/14 Conservatorship of Richard R. 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

Conservatorship of the Person of RICHARD R. D063837 SAN DIEGO COUNTY HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES AGENCY, Petitioner and Respondent, (Super. Ct. No. MH98305)

v. RICHARD R., Objector and Appellant.

APPEAL from a judgment of the Superior Court of San Diego County, Joseph P.

Brannigan, Judge. Affirmed.

Neil R. Trop, under appointment by the Court of Appeal, for Objector and Appellant.

Thomas E. Montgomery, County Counsel, and George Seikaly and Christina I.

Vilaseca, Deputy County Counsel, for Petitioner and Respondent. Richard R. appeals from a judgment reestablishing conservatorship of his person under the Lanterman-Petris-Short Act (LPS Act or Act). (Welf. & Inst. Code, § 5000 et seq.) He contends the court violated Probate Code section 1825, subdivision (a),1 which mandates that he be "produced at" his conservatorship reestablishment hearing, when it denied his request to appear in person and held the hearing with Richard participating via videoconference from Santa Cruz, California. He further contends the court's ruling violated his due process rights under the United States Constitution. We conclude any error was harmless and affirm the judgment.

FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND

I. Background Facts Richard is an adult male in his mid-50's who has suffered from mental illness since he was 15 years old. His mental illness history includes schizophrenia, psychosis, and chronic paranoia. He has been hospitalized at least 28 times since 1992 and has demonstrated poor compliance with treatment plans when he is outside of a structured and locked environment. Richard is in denial of both his mental condition and his need for medication and has indicated that he will not continue taking his medication once he is released from a locked facility.

Richard's mental illness manifests itself in several different ways. He experiences illogical thoughts, confusion about the days of the week, delusions, time distortion, hears radio broadcasts from the Federal Bureau of Investigation and Central Intelligence 1 Unless otherwise indicated, all further statutory references are to the Probate Code. 2 Agency in his head, and is assaultive against others. As a result of his mental illness and its manifestations, he has had difficulty caring for himself, has missed meals and has to be reminded to perform routine activities of daily living.

As a result of the above, Richard has been under continuous conservatorship since May 26, 2005. Since 2008, he has lived predominantly in locked mental health institutions such as the Metropolitan State Hospital and 7th Avenue Center in Santa Cruz, where he currently resides. However, in or around June 2012, Richard lived in Opal Cliff Residential Center (Opal Cliff), a residential board and care facility in Santa Cruz.

Within a few months, Richard assaulted a caregiver who tried to administer his medication and was admitted to an acute psychiatric hospital as a result. When he returned to Opal Cliff, he assaulted the center's administrator by biting him, was again admitted to an acute care hospital, and was then placed at the 7th Avenue Center, where he has been since.

On January 24, 2013, the San Diego County Health and Human Services Agency, through the Office of the Public Conservator (the public conservator), filed a petition to reestablish conservatorship of Richard's person on the basis that he remained gravely disabled and was unable to provide for his basic needs of food, clothing, and shelter. The public conservator sought to place Richard in an unlocked, open treatment facility and to impose various disabilities upon him.

II. Procedural Background Since 2005, the San Diego County Public Defender and public conservator have operated under an understanding that allows for proposed conservatees who are 3 physically outside San Diego County to appear at hearings by videoconference.

However, on March 19, 2013, Richard's counsel objected and requested Richard be physically present at the hearing to reestablish his conservatorship. After the parties briefed the issue and the court heard argument, the court denied Richard's request.

On April 9, 2013, the court held a hearing on the public conservator's petition to reestablish conservatorship of Richard, who appeared by videoconference as the court previously ordered. Based on Richard's testimony, a "Medical Recommendation & Declaration for Reestablishment of Conservatorship" signed by two psychiatrists in Santa Cruz, and testimony from the public conservator's staff forensic psychologist,2 the court found beyond a reasonable doubt that Richard continued to be gravely disabled, reappointed the public conservator as conservator of his person, and ordered him to remain in a closed and locked treatment facility until at least April 9, 2014.

On appeal, Richard contends the court's denial of his request to be physically present at the hearing violated his due process rights under the Constitution and his statutory rights under section 1825, subdivision (a).

2 The public conservator's forensic psychologist, Alma Carpio, Psy.D., interviewed Richard via videoconference and reviewed a statement of facts prepared by the public conservator's office. Dr. Carpio's recommendations largely aligned with the two psychiatrists in Santa Cruz, except that she recommended Richard be confined to a closed and locked facility while the Santa Cruz doctors recommended Richard be placed in an open, intermediate care facility. Dr. Carpio so recommended in part because Richard had "a significant history of noncompliance with medication when placed at lower levels of care." 4 DISCUSSION I. Judicial Notice As an initial matter, the public conservator asks us to take judicial notice of two documents. The first document is the public conservator's general policies and procedures for placing conservatees outside of San Diego County. The second document is a purported excerpt from a countywide memorandum prepared in 2006 by a manager who worked at the public conservator's office. We deny the public conservator's request for judicial notice.

The public conservator contends we may take notice of these documents under Evidence Code section 452, subdivision (h), which allows judicial notice of "[f]acts and propositions that are not reasonably subject to dispute and are capable of immediate and accurate determination by resort to sources of reasonably indisputable accuracy."

However, we need not take notice of matters that were not presented to the trial court.

(Haworth v. Superior Court (2010) 50 Cal.4th 372, 379.)

Here, the record does not establish that the public conservator submitted either document in support of its briefing before the trial court. Nor does the public conservator contend it previously proffered these documents to the trial court. Accordingly, we decline to take judicial notice of the documents the public conservator presents for the first time on appeal.

II. Probate Code Section 1825 Richard contends section 1825's unambiguous language required his physical presence at the reestablishment hearing. The public conservator contends section 1825 is 5 ambiguous and allows for conservatees' virtual presence at hearings using videoconferencing technology. Without deciding whether the trial court erred, we conclude that any assumed error was harmless.

The LPS Act governs the involuntary detention, evaluation, and treatment of persons who, as a result of mental disorder, are dangerous or gravely disabled. (Welf. & Inst. Code, § 5150 et seq.) The Act authorizes the superior court to appoint a conservator of the person for one who is determined to be gravely disabled (Welf. & Inst. Code, § 5350 et seq.), so that he or she may receive individualized treatment, supervision, and placement (id., § 5350.1). As defined by the Act, a person is " 'gravely disabled' " if, as a result of a mental disorder, the person "is unable to provide for his or her basic personal needs for food, clothing, or shelter." (Welf. & Inst. Code, § 5008, subd. (h)(1)(A).)

Although the Act makes no express mention of a specific requirement for the presence of a proposed conservatee at a hearing to establish a conservatorship of the person, it mandates that LPS conservatorships shall be established pursuant to the procedure set forth in the Probate Code. (Welf. & Inst. Code, § 5350.) In turn, Probate Code section 1825, subdivision (a) provides that "[t]he proposed conservatee shall be produced" at the hearing to establish a conservatorship, subject to three exceptions that do not apply here.

We review the trial court's interpretation and application of section 1825 de novo.

(Conservatorship of John L. (2010) 48 Cal.4th 131, 142.) However, error in the denial of a statutory right is subject to the harmless error analysis of People v. Watson (1956) 46 Cal.2d 818. (People v. Epps (2001) 25 Cal.4th 19, 29; D.E. v. Superior Court (2003) 111 Cal.App.4th 502, 513-514.) Before any judgment can be reversed for error under state 6 law, it must appear that the error complained of "has resulted in a miscarriage of justice."

(Cal. Const., art. VI, § 13; see Cassim v. Allstate Ins. Co. (2004) 33 Cal.4th 780, 801.)

This means that reversal is justified "when the court, 'after an examination of the entire cause, including the evidence,' is of the 'opinion' that it is reasonably probable that a result more favorable to the appealing party would have been reached in the absence of the error." (Watson, at p. 836.)

Here, without deciding whether proposed conservatees in LPS proceedings have a statutory right under section 1825 to be physically present at conservatorship hearings, we conclude that any violation of the right in this case was harmless. On the record before us, the evidence of Richard's continued grave disability was overwhelming. At the time of the reestablishment hearing, he had been under conservatorship for several years, two physicians in Santa Cruz opined that he continued to be unable to care for himself, and a third doctor opined the same and testified as the public conservator's witness.

Richard also did not present any credible evidence that contradicted his continued gave disability. Moreover, Richard had physically assaulted two persons during his then-most- recent conservatorship period when he briefly resided at a lower level care facility. Other compelling evidence before the court included his history of institutionalization and conservatorship, continuing diagnosis and resulting manifestations, and his stated desire to discontinue his medications. Thus, even if Richard had been physically present at the hearing, he could not have obtained a more favorable result.

7 III. Due Process In conservatorship cases, conservatees are entitled to certain due process protections, and "we balance three factors to determine whether a particular procedure or absence of a procedure violates due process: the private interests at stake, the state or public interest, and the risk that the procedure or its absence will lead to erroneous decisions." (Conservatorship of John L., supra, 48 Cal.4th at p. 150.) In reviewing constitutional error in civil commitment proceedings, we apply the test in Chapman v. California (1967) 386 U.S. 18 that "federal constitutional error is reversible unless shown to be harmless beyond a reasonable doubt . . . ." (People v. Hurtado (2002) 28 Cal.4th 1179, 1194.)

Here, we do not decide whether videoconferencing in general or as applied in this case violated due process. For the reasons explained above, any error in denying Richard his due process rights at the reestablishment hearing was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt. In light of the overwhelming evidence at the hearing, we have no doubt the court would have reestablished conservatorship over Richard had he been physically present.

DISPOSITION

The judgment is affirmed.

NARES, J. WE CONCUR:

HUFFMAN, Acting P. J.

IRION, J.

Cites, in this corpus

Haworth v. Superior Court of Los Angeles County S165906 · 2010-08-02
San Diego County Health & Human Services Agency v. John L. No. S157151 · 2010-02-25
Cassim v. Allstate Insurance S109711 · 2004-10-13
D. E. v. Superior Court G032293 · 2003-07-30
People v. Hurtado S082112 · 2002-08-22
People v. Epps S082110 · 2001-03-05
People v. Watson Crim. 5813 · 1956-07-03