Filed 9/30/26 P. v. Doulphus CA3
NOT TO BE PUBLISHED
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 This opinion has not been certified for publication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.
IN THE COURT OF APPEAL OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA
THIRD APPELLATE DISTRICT
(Tehama)
THE PEOPLE, C103638
Plaintiff and Respondent,
(Super. Ct. No. NCR88402)
v.
ALAN DUANE DOULPHUS,
Defendant and Appellant.
Appellant Alan Duane Doulphus pleaded guilty to voluntary manslaughter and
three counts of robbery and admitted discharging a firearm during the robbery offenses.
In a prior appeal, we remanded for the trial court to recalculate his custody credits but
otherwise affirmed the judgment. On remand, the trial court awarded Doulphus a total of
3,516 days of credit, including 3,374 actual custody days and 142 days of conduct credit.
In Doulphus’s appeal from that ruling, appointed counsel filed an opening brief
under People v. Wende (1979) 25 Cal.3d 436, asking this court to conduct an independent
review of the record and determine whether there are any arguable issues on appeal.
Doulphus filed a supplemental brief raising three issues concerning the trial court’s
recalculation of his custody credit. Finding no error in the trial court’s ruling and having
reviewed the record as required by Wende, we will affirm.
1
BACKGROUND
In October 2013, Doulphus, his brother, and a third codefendant were jointly
charged with multiple offenses, including murder, robbery, and assault with a firearm,
after robbing three victims at gunpoint at a marijuana farm and shooting and killing one
of them during the incident. (People v. Doulphus (Sept. 28, 2018, C082044) [nonpub.
opn.] (Doulphus I).) In March 2016, Doulphus pleaded guilty to an added voluntary
manslaughter charge (Pen. Code, § 192, subd. (a)) and three counts of second degree
robbery (§ 211).1 He admitted discharging a firearm during each robbery offense
(§ 12022.53, subd. (c)). The remaining counts were dismissed.
On May 9, 2016, Doulphus was sentenced to 42 years four months in state prison.
He was awarded 950 actual custody days and 142 conduct days (§ 2933.1) for a total of
1,092 days of presentence credit.
Doulphus appealed, and we remanded to allow the trial court to consider
exercising its discretion to strike the firearm enhancements under new legislation that
took effect before his conviction became final. (Doulphus I, supra, C082044.) On
remand, the trial court struck two of the firearm enhancements, reducing Doulphus’s
prison sentence to 29 years.
Doulphus appealed a second time, arguing that the matter should be remanded to
allow the trial court to exercise its discretion to impose a lesser enhancement in place of
the sole remaining firearm enhancement. (People v. Doulphus (June 30, 2021, C089263)
[nonpub. opn.] (Doulphus II).) While that appeal was pending, Doulphus and the
prosecution stipulated to the dismissal of his manslaughter conviction, reducing his
sentence to 27 years. (People v. Doulphus (Jan. 17, 2025, C097692) [nonpub. opn.]
(Doulphus IV).) In an unpublished opinion, this court initially affirmed the trial court’s
ruling. (Ibid.) This court later vacated Doulphus’s sentence upon transfer from the
1 Undesignated statutory references are to the Penal Code.
2
California Supreme Court and remanded to allow the trial court to exercise its discretion
whether to impose a lesser uncharged enhancement in light of new California Supreme
Court precedent. (People v. Doulphus (June 30, 2022, C089263) [nonpub. opn.]
(Doulphus III).)
On December 28, 2022, on remand following his second appeal, the trial court
conducted a resentencing hearing. (Doulphus IV, supra, C097692.) The court declined
to dismiss or reduce the remaining firearm enhancement but lowered the sentence on one
robbery count from the previously imposed upper term to the middle term. (Ibid.) The
court sentenced Doulphus to 25 years in prison. (Ibid.) It did not recalculate his custody
credits, instead awarding him the same number of credits as when he was originally
sentenced in 2016. (Ibid.)
Doulphus appealed for a third time, asserting various claims of error in his
sentence. (Doulphus IV, supra, C097692.) He also argued that the trial court had erred
in failing to recalculate his custody credits at resentencing. (Ibid.) This court rejected
Doulphus’s claims of sentencing error but concluded that the trial court had erroneously
failed to award actual custody credits for the period between the original May 2016
sentencing and the December 2022 resentencing. (Ibid.) We directed the trial court to
recalculate his custody credits and prepare an amended abstract of judgment. (Ibid.) We
otherwise affirmed the judgment. (Ibid.)
On April 7, 2025, the trial court held a hearing to recalculate Doulphus’s custody
credits. The court granted defense counsel’s request to appear pursuant to section 977,
waiving Doulphus’s presence. Doulphus was not present at the hearing.
The trial court calculated Doulphus’s custody credits for the period from the initial
sentencing on May 9, 2016 to the date of resentencing on December 28, 2022. The court
awarded him an additional 2,424 days of actual custody credit, plus the original 950 days
of presentence actual credit, for a total of 3,374 days of actual custody credit. The court
awarded Doulphus no additional days of conduct credit, which remained at 142 days.
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Doulphus’s total custody credit award as of the December 2022 resentencing hearing was
3,516 days (3,374 actual days plus 142 days of conduct credit).
Doulphus timely appealed. His counsel filed a no-issue brief under People v.
Wende, supra, 25 Cal.3d 436, and Doulphus filed a supplemental brief.
DISCUSSION
Doulphus’s supplemental brief asserts three principal claims: (1) the trial court
erred in recalculating his custody credits; (2) this court’s remand entitled him to a full
resentencing; and (3) his due process rights were violated when the trial court
recalculated his custody credits in his absence, without his knowing and intentional
waiver of his right to be present.
When “an appellate remand results in modification of a felony sentence during the
term of imprisonment,” as occurred here, “the trial court must calculate the actual time
the defendant has already served and credit that time against the ‘subsequent sentence.’ ”
(People v. Buckhalter (2001) 26 Cal.4th 20, 23.) But “a convicted felon once sentenced,
committed, and delivered to prison is not restored to presentence status, for purposes of
the sentence-credit statutes, by virtue of a limited appellate remand for correction of
sentencing errors.” (Ibid.) The inmate “cannot earn good behavior credits under the
formula specifically applicable to persons detained in a local facility, or under equivalent
circumstances elsewhere, ‘prior to the imposition of sentence’ for a felony. [Citations.]”
(Ibid.)
As to Doulphus’s first claim, on remand following his third appeal, the trial court
complied with this court’s directive to calculate Doulphus’s actual custody credits for the
period between his initial 2016 sentencing and his resentencing in 2022, consistent with
the principles announced in Buckhalter. Doulphus claims that the trial court’s
recalculation was in error, pointing to what he characterizes as “major discrepancies”
between the credits he was awarded as compared to the number of credits he says his
codefendant brother was awarded a week later at a separate hearing. In support of this
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claim, Doulphus attached to his supplemental brief an abstract of judgment showing the
credits his brother received. We have no occasion to consider Doulphus’s brother’s
relative credit awards because his brother’s abstract of judgment is not part of the record
on appeal. (In re Rogers (1980) 28 Cal.3d 429, 437, fn. 6 [appellate court is limited to
considering matters contained in record of trial court proceedings, and matters “ ‘ “not
presented by the record cannot be considered on the suggestion of” ’ ” a party’s brief];
Turrieta v. Lyft (2024) 16 Cal.5th 664, 697 [“reviewing courts ‘do not consider’
unsupported ‘factual assertions’ in appellate briefs ‘that find no basis in the record’ ”].)
As to Doulphus’s second contention that he was entitled to a full resentencing on
remand, we disagree. Section 1260, which sets out the permissible dispositions of a
cause on appeal, authorizes a reviewing court to “remand the cause to the trial court for
such further proceedings as may be just under the circumstances.” Where, as here, a trial
court has made a mistake in calculating credits, a limited remand to correct that error
without a full resentencing is appropriate. (See, e.g., People v. Gonzalez (2025)
108 Cal.App.5th 741, 748, review granted Apr. 30, 2025, S289874 (Gonzalez).)2 In
correcting that error here, “the trial court had no discretion—it simply had to recalculate
the number of days of custody credit,” and doing so “would not in any way impact”
2 In Gonzalez, our Supreme Court ordered briefing deferred pending a decision in
People v. Esquivias, S286371, in which the Court of Appeal considered whether “a trial
court that grants habeas corpus review to reconsider one aspect of a defendant’s sentence
[is] obligated to grant review to reconsider all aspects of the defendant’s sentence and
thereby give the defendant the benefit of all ameliorative laws that took effect after the
defendant’s conviction and sentence became final.” (People v. Esquivias (2024)
103 Cal.App.5th 969, 975.) Doulphus’s case is not in a comparable posture, as it comes
to us on direct appeal following a limited remand that this court ordered in a decision in
which we directed the recalculation of custody credits but affirmed the judgment in all
other respects. (Doulphus IV, supra, C097692.) And in People v. Esquivias (2026)
20 Cal.5th 734, 744, our Supreme Court recently concluded that “a habeas corpus court,
having determined that a remedy is warranted,” was not “obligated in the situation
presented [there] to reopen a sentence for all purposes instead of ordering tailored relief.”
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Doulphus’s convictions or sentence, which we had affirmed in full. (Gonzalez, at
pp. 749-750.) The trial court’s recalculation of custody credits therefore did not warrant
a full resentencing hearing.
Finally, we reject Doulphus’s third contention, which asserts that his due process
rights were violated when the trial court recalculated his custody credits in his absence.
At the outset, we note that Doulphus’s appointed trial counsel entered an oral waiver of
Doulphus’s presence at the recalculation hearing pursuant to section 977, which the trial
court approved. Under section 977, a defendant may waive his or her right to be
physically or remotely present in writing, or, with the court’s consent, such waiver may
be entered by the defendant’s counsel of record. Doulphus does not address the
section 977 waiver. Regardless, Doulphus has not established any prejudicial error in the
trial court’s decision to proceed in his absence. (See Gonzalez, supra, 108 Cal.App.5th at
pp. 752-753, rev. granted [rejecting argument that trial court violated defendant’s
constitutional due process rights by modifying his credits in his absence and without a
hearing or, alternatively, finding any error harmless beyond a reasonable doubt].)
Doulphus asserts that his presence would have been helpful to resolve disputed factual
issues and to ensure clarity in the trial court’s ruling. In support of this claim, he attaches
a document regarding a grievance concerning his release date calculation. Because this
document is not part of the record on appeal, we do not consider it. (In re Rogers, supra,
28 Cal.3d at p. 437, fn. 6; Turrieta v. Lyft, supra, 16 Cal.5th at p. 697.) In any event, we
do not perceive disputable factual issues or a lack of clarity in the trial court’s
pronouncement of the corrected custody credit award; and we see no possibility that there
would have been a more favorable ruling had Doulphus been present.
Having considered and rejected Doulphus’s contentions in his supplemental brief,
and after reviewing the record as required by Wende, we find no arguable error that
would result in a disposition more favorable to Doulphus.
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DISPOSITION
The judgment is affirmed.
/s/
FEINBERG, J.
We concur:
/s/
HULL, Acting P. J.
/s/
MAURO, J.
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