P. v. Gaskin
Filed 3/20/13 P. v. Gaskin CA4/3
NOT TO BE PUBLISHED IN OFFICIAL REPORTS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opinion has not been certified for publication or ordered published for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.
IN THE COURT OF
APPEAL OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA
FOURTH APPELLATE
DISTRICT
DIVISION THREE
THE PEOPLE,
Plaintiff and
Respondent,
v.
DERRELL LAMAR GASKIN,
Defendant and
Appellant.
G046130
(Super. Ct.
No. 10CF0374)
O P I N I O
N
Appeal from a judgment
of the Superior Court
of
County, Richard M. King, Judge. Affirmed.
Patrick J. Hennessey,
Jr., under appointment by the Court of Appeal, for Defendant and Appellant.
Kamala D. Harris,
Attorney General, Dane R. Gillette, Chief Assistant Attorney General, Julie L.
Garland, Assistant Attorney General, Peter Quon, Jr., and Lilia E. Garcia,
Deputy Attorneys General, for Plaintiff and Respondent.
* * *
A jury found defendant
Derrell Lamar Gaskin guilty of battery
resulting in serious bodily injury and assault by means of force likely to
cause great bodily injury. The jury also
found defendant had inflicted great bodily injury on the victim. The trial court sentenced defendant to 15
years in state prison.
Defendant appeals
contending the court should have suspended the proceedings and re-evaluated his
mental state based on his
trial testimony and the testimony of an expert witness. He also contends the sentence imposed
constituted an abuse of the court’s discretion.
We disagree with both contentions and affirm the judgment.
FACTS
Annabel Rodriguez was
walking her six-year-old son to school when she noticed defendant, whom she had
never met, walking past her. He stopped,
turned around, and without any comment, struck her in the face, knocking her to
the ground and shattering her nose. The
incident was witnessed by a passing motorist.
Shortly before the
originally scheduled trial, defendant’s lawyer declared doubt regarding
defendant’s competence. The court
ordered the criminal proceedings suspended and appointed a psychologist and a
psychiatrist to examine defendant. Some
weeks later, the court conducted a mental competency hearing and considered the
two experts reports; both opined defendant was competent to stand trial. The court ordered criminal proceedings
reinstated.
During the trial,
defendant testified that he had noticed a female and a small child. After he passed them, he saw her trip and
fall into the street. When he turned
back to help her, they were both struck by a passing car. Defendant also testified to having had a most
unusual background. In 2000, he played
quarterback for the Los Angeles Raiders.
At the same time, he played basketball for the Chicago Bulls, baseball
for the New York Yankees, and hockey for the Los Angeles Kings. He had also received a master’s degree in
medicine. He testified he had been
confined to a mental facility and offered drugs for mental illness. But he denied ever taking psychotropic drugs.
Dr. Thomas Grayden, a
professor of psychiatry at UCI, testified defendant was psychotic, suffered
from schizophrenia, would break from reality, suffer hallucinations, and
delusional thinking.
On the sentencing date,
defendant’s lawyer again declared doubt as to defendant’s competence. Criminal proceedings were, once again,
suspended and the court again appointed two experts, including Grayden to
examine defendant. Thereafter, a jury
trial was conducted to determine defendant’s competence. Both experts testified and the jury found the
defendant to be mentally competent. The
court thereupon sentenced defendant.
DISCUSSION
defendant was competent to be tried.
Each time that
defendant’s counsel declared a doubt about defendant’s competence to proceed,
the court followed the proper procedure.
When the issue was first raised before trial, the court concluded, based
on the information supplied by experts, that defendant was competent and
reinstated the criminal proceedings. The
second time counsel declared doubt about defendant’s competence before
sentencing, the issue was tried and the jury found the defendant to be
competent. The evidence supported the
court’s and jury’s conclusions.
Dr. Thomas J. Greenzang,
one of the psychiatrists
who examined defendant before trial, noted that defendant acknowledged “he was
charged with assault. He indicated a
female alleged that he struck her with a fist in the face.†Greenzang noted that, although defendant
“presented as being somewhat isolated during the current evaluation†and “[h]is
thinking appeared to be somewhat constricted, [h]e did not manifest overt
hallucinations or delusions. He was able
to respond appropriately to questions.â€
Greenzang expressed the opinion that defendant’s “history is consistent
with his having schizoid personality traits . . . a potential diagnosis is
schizoaffective disorder.†But Greenzang
also stated that defendant “did understand the nature of the charges against
him. [Defendant] indicated that he is
charged with assault. He was able to
provide the name of his attorney. He
expressed a belief that he could cooperate with her. He had a general understanding of the roles
of individuals involved in the legal proceedings.†Greenzang claimed it was his opinion that “at
the time of the current evaluation . . . [defendant] is competent to face the
charges against him.†The pretrial
competency hearing was based on this report as well as the report of Dr. Jody
Ward, a psychologist.
Ward reached similar
conclusions. She stated defendant’s
“thinking was goal oriented and directed through most of the interview,
including the discussion of his current charges and the court case. When not discussing his mental health
history, his reasoning was intact. His
thinking became strange when discussing his mental health history. It appears that he may suffer from some type
of mental illness like Schizophrenia.
But overall, he knew [the] charges; the possible outcomes; the plea
agreement . . . he [had been] offered; and the fact [a conviction] would
[constitute] two strikes and how those strikes [would] affect his
sentencing. He knew the roles of the
court officers as well. He had an
alternate explanation for his behavior at the time of the alleged crime and
appears to be able to assist his attorney in preparing his defense.â€
These reports provide
substantial evidence supporting the court’s conclusion defendant was competent
to stand trial.
As we noted, when
defendant testified, he presented a work history that was obviously false. We need not belabor why a person could not
have been employed at the same time by major league sports teams in four
different sports. But would such
testimony tend to show that Greenzang and Ward were mistaken or that
defendant’s competency had deteriorated since their examinations? We do not believe that, even if defendant
truly believed his fantastic accomplishments in professional sports, this would
tend to show lack of competency to proceed with the trial. But defendant does not rely solely on this
testimony; he also relies on the testimony of Grayden, a psychiatrist who
testified on his behalf.
Grayden expressed the
opinion that defendant “has clearly a psychotic disorder and I think it would
be best characterized, at least based on available information, as
schizophrenia.†According to Grayden,
defendant’s symptoms included hallucinations, delusional and disorganized
thinking, and memory problems.
Schizophrenics also have a high rate of suicide and tend to be
impulsive. Grayden had learned from
defendant’s sister that defendant had been hospitalized in a mental facility
and prescribed psychiatric medications.
But it is noteworthy Grayden’s testimony did not suggest defendant’s
schizophrenia rendered him incompetent to stand trial or incapable of either
understanding the proceedings or cooperating with his counsel.
Nor did defendant’s
counsel suggest after receipt of this testimony that she had doubts about
defendant’s competence to proceed.
We do not disagree with
the proposition asserted by defendant’s counsel that “[a] criminal trial of a
mentally incompetent person violates due process.†(Capitalization omitted.) (People
v. Lewis (2006) 39 Cal.4th 970, 1047; People v. Ramos (2004) 34 Cal.4th 494, 507.) But, the evidence presented at trial,
including both defendant’s fantastic recitations about his athletic
accomplishments and the testimony of Grayden, did not suggest his condition
differed from what he had presented to the psychiatrist and psychologist who
had examined him before trial. And,
based on essentially the same information, Greenzang and Ward both had opined
that defendant was nevertheless competent to proceed with the trial. “[A] defendant must exhibit more than bizarre
. . . behavior, strange words, or a preexisting psychiatric condition that has
little bearing on the question of whether the defendant can assist his defense
counsel. [Citations.]†(People
v. Ramos, supra, 34 Cal.4th at p.
508.) Defendant acknowledges that
“[w]here a competency hearing has already been held and the defendant has been
found competent to stand trial, a trial court is not required to conduct
another competency hearing unless it is presented with a change of
circumstances or with new evidence that gives rise to a serious doubt about the
validity of the previous competency finding.â€
(See also People v. Medina
(1995) 11 Cal.4th 694, 734.)
After Grayden’s
testimony the court stated that “he did indicate the defendant does have a
mental disorder, but there is nothing before me that indicates a changed
circumstance between when the defendant was found to be competent I believe in
August or September and now.†It then
solicited counsel’s comment on this issue and counsel declined to be
heard. Defendant’s counsel would be in a
better position than the judge, or anyone else for that matter, to evaluate
whether defendant understood the nature of the proceedings and whether he was
able to assist counsel in his defense.
Counsel’s silence on the subject when invited by the court to express her
opinion is thus significant.
The court found the
prior convictions, one prior strike (Pen. Code, §§ 667, subds. (d), (e)(1); 1170.12, subds. (b),
(c)(1); all further statutory references are to the Penal Code) and a serious
prior felony (§ 667, subd. (a)(1)) to be true. It also found defendant suffered two prison
priors (§ 667.5, subd. (b)).
Defendant moved to strike the prior strike allegations and the great
bodily injury enhancement; the court denied the motion. It then sentenced defendant to double the
middle term of 3 years for the assault charge under sections 667, subdivisions
(d), (e)(1) and 1170.12, subdivisions (b), (c)(1), and stayed the sentence on
the battery count under section 654. It
further sentenced defendant to 3 years consecutive on the enhancement
(§ 12022.7, subd. (a)), 5 years for the prior serious felony (§§ 667,
subd. (a)(1)-1192.7), 1 year for one prison prior (§ 667.5, subd. (b)),
and stayed punishment for the second prison prior. Thus, the total sentence was for 15 years.
The court denied
defendant’s motion to strike the priors under People v. Superior Court (Romero) (1994) 13 Cal.4th 497. In denying the motion, the court considered
both defendant’s prior criminal history and the vulnerability of the
victim. Defendant argues this ruling was
an abuse of discretion because of his mental health history and his prior
criminal history did not involve violence.
As defendant notes,
citing People v. Williams (1998) 17
Cal.4th 148, 160-161, before the court may dismiss an allegation of a prior
strike conviction, it must conclude he was outside the spirit of the three
strikes sentencing scheme. But our
review is for abuse of discretion and, based on the facts of this case, we
cannot conclude that the trial court ruled in an “arbitrary, capricious or
patently absurd manner that resulted in a manifest
v. Jordan (1986) 42 Cal.3d 308, 316.)
As the Attorney General points out, citing People v. Carmony (2004) 33 Cal.4th 367, 378, there is a
“presumption that any sentence that conforms to these sentencing norms†set
forth in the “Three Strikes†law is both rational and proper. And “‘[it] is not enough to show that reasonable
people might disagree about whether to strike one or more’ prior conviction
allegations.†(People v. Myers (1999) 69 Cal.App.4th 305, 310.) It would be inappropriate for us to second
guess the trial court here.
DISPOSITION
The judgment is
affirmed.
RYLAARSDAM,
ACTING P. J.
WE CONCUR:
ARONSON, J.
IKOLA, J.
