Filed 10/21/26 P. v. Rosas CA4/1
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COURT OF APPEAL, FOURTH APPELLATE DISTRICT
DIVISION ONE
STATE OF CALIFORNIA
THE PEOPLE,
D085735
Plaintiff and Respondent,
(Super. Ct. No. JCF006228)
v.
STEVEN ROSAS,
Defendant and Appellant.
APPEAL from a judgment of the Superior Court of Imperial County,
Christopher J. Plourd, Judge. Affirmed.
Bruce L. Kotler, under appointment by the Court of Appeal, for
Defendant and Appellant.
Rob Bonta, Attorney General, Charles C. Ragland, Chief Assistant
Attorney General, Arlene A. Sevidal, Assistant Attorney General,
Christopher P. Beesley and Namita Patel, Deputy Attorneys General, for
Plaintiff and Respondent.
INTRODUCTION
Steven Rosas appeals one of his two convictions for stalking while a
restraining order is in effect (Pen. Code,1 § 646.9, subd. (a)), asserting the
charge is time-barred. We affirm.
BACKGROUND
I.
Procedural History
On September 29, 2023, the People filed an information charging Rosas
with two felony counts of stalking while a restraining order is in effect
(§ 646.9, subd. (a); counts 1 and 2) and two misdemeanor counts of violating a
protective order (§ 273.6, subd. (a); counts 3 and 4); and further alleging he
suffered a prior strike conviction (§§ 667, subds. (b)–(i), 1170.12, subds. (a)–
(d)).
In 2024, a jury convicted Rosas on all four counts and found true that
he suffered a prior strike conviction. The trial court sentenced Rosas to eight
years in state prison for stalking as charged in count 1, calculated as the
upper term of four years doubled for the prior strike, and a consecutive two-
year prison term for stalking as charged in count 2, calculated as one-third
the middle-term sentence of three years doubled for the prior strike. The
court imposed, but stayed, two one-year sentences for the misdemeanors
charged in counts 3 and 4.
1 Further unspecified statutory references are to the Penal Code.
2
II.
Trial Evidence
Jane Doe and Rosas lived together for over 20 years, were married for
five years, and shared four children. Rosas first became violent with Doe in
1999. At that time, she was holding their infant son in her arms when Rosas
pushed her into a closet. After this, there were multiple incidents in which
Rosas was high on drugs, got irritated with little things, and snapped at Doe.
During these incidents, he would yell at her and call her names.
Doe first reported Rosas’s conduct to the police in August 2018, after he
refused to allow her to leave the house and then pushed her, causing her to
slip and fall. One of their children jumped on Rosas’s back to push him away
from Doe during this episode. Doe took the children and left Rosas. On
August 24, 2018, she obtained a criminal protective order prohibiting him
from having any contact with her. She also started divorce proceedings
sometime in 2019 or 2020.
Sometime in 2019 or 2020, while the criminal protective order was
active, Rosas sent two videos to Doe’s phone which made her fear for her
life.2
In the first video, Rosas told Doe: “You think it’s a fucking game,
watch, bitch, I’m gonna have the last laugh, watch. Imma end up fucking
getting your ass, Imma end up putting you in that fucking hole, I’m gonna
end up killing you watch. You think it’s a fucking joke, dude, I’m not fucking
playing with your ass you fucking fat bitch, you fucking on the motherfucking
2 For the content of the videos, both parties rely on the transcripts
presented to the jury and included in the clerk’s transcript as exhibits 5A and
6A.
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Facebook at 3 o’clock in the morning, watch, Imma end up killing you, you
think I’m joking?”
In the second video, Rosas told Doe: “Keep thinking I’m fucking
playing, bitch. Watch, go ahead, go ahead, I’m letting you get away with
everything you can because I already fucking caught you in so much bullshit,
dude. Everything I said you’re fucking doing, you are doing, just fucking
making lies of it, it’s alright, I already caught you. I’m gonna to fuck you up
if you don’t tell me who it is, watch.”
Doe reported these videos to the police.
After the videos, Rosas called Doe sometime in 2020. He told her he
was out of custody, prompting her to hang up the phone and report the call to
police. Rosas did not explicitly threaten her during this call.
On May 20, 2022, Doe renewed a family law domestic violence
restraining order (DVRO) she previously obtained against Rosas. On
June 10, 2022, Rosas called her again and told her he was out of custody.
Doe was scared, immediately hung up, and reported the call to her son and
the police that same night. Doe changed her phone number three times to
avoid Rosas’s harassment.
A few days later, while the DVRO was active, Rosas began sending text
messages to Doe. Rosas continued texting Doe until at least October 10,
2022. On that day, Rosas told Doe “that he was next [to] [her] car, for [her] to
get ready ‘cause it was going to—it was going to happen, that he was ready,”
and “shit was going to hit the fan.” Rosas also sent Doe pictures of guns,
which she took to mean “he was going to come and shoot [her].” His final text
message on that date read, “You’re not safe behind the new gate up FYI,”
showing Rosas was aware that Doe’s apartment complex had recently
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installed a fence with an electric gate. This caused Doe to believe Rosas had
driven by her apartment.
On December 8, 2022, Doe obtained a criminal protective order against
Rosas for the pendency of the instant case. But after she obtained this order
and while criminal charges were pending against Rosas, Doe received a
postcard which, although appearing in the name of Rosas’s brother, she
believed was written by Rosas. The postcard read, in part, “Good luck on the
trial ahead that my brother gots (sic) in store for you because you’re going to
need it. With all the witnesses coming to court for him, like I say, God bless
you. Be ready for this one.” At the bottom of the card were the words “ha,
ha, ha” and “Oh, yeah. P.S., Tell your new man to put food on the table.
Don’t send the kids to my grandma’s house for food. That’s one little dude
you got.” Doe believed Rosas was trying to scare her because this was the
first time she was taking steps to hold him accountable through the court
process.
DISCUSSION
Relevant to this appeal, the People alleged that Rosas committed
stalking with a restraining order in effect on or about July 6, 2022 in count 1,
and on or about October 31, 2022 in count 2. As the parties agree, the statute
of limitations on the crime of stalking under section 646.9 is three years.3 As
3 See § 646.9, subd. (b) [stalking while protective order in effect
punishable by two, three, or four years in prison]; § 801 [“offense punishable
by imprisonment in the state prison . . . shall be commenced within three
years”]; see also § 800 [“offense punishable by imprisonment in the state
prison for eight years or more . . . shall be commenced within six years”
(italics added)]; § 805 [“Any enhancement of punishment prescribed by
statute shall be disregarded in determining the maximum punishment
prescribed by statute for an offense.”].
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they further agree, Rosas’s prosecution for count 1 commenced on October 7,
2022, when the trial court issued the arrest warrant on that count. (§ 804
[felony prosecution commences when an indictment or information is filed,
when the defendant is arraigned on a complaint, or an arrest warrant is
issued].) Accordingly, the People had to prove Rosas committed the elements
of count 1 on or after October 7, 2019.
Rosas argues his conviction on count 1 is time-barred because there is
no evidence that he engaged in stalking conduct after October 7, 2019.4 We
disagree. Our review is for substantial evidence, in which we look at “ ‘the
whole record in the light most favorable to the judgment below to determine
whether it discloses substantial evidence—that is, evidence which is
reasonable, credible, and of solid value—such that a reasonable trier of fact
could find the defendant guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.’ ” (People v.
Collins (2025) 17 Cal. 5th 293, 307.)
The crime of stalking under section 646.9 requires “a credible threat
with the intent to place [a] person in reasonable fear for their safety[.]”
(§ 646.9, subd. (a).) A ‘credible threat’ is defined as “a verbal or written
threat, . . . or a threat implied by a pattern of conduct or a combination of
verbal, written, or electronically communicated statements and
conduct, . . . made with the intent to place the person that is the target of the
threat in reasonable fear for their safety, or the safety of their family[.]” (Id.,
subd. (g), italics added.) “ ‘[I]n determining whether a threat occurred, the
entire factual context, including the surrounding events and the reaction of
4 Rosas does not challenge his conviction for count 2. He concedes the
series of threatening text messages he sent to Doe on October 10, 2022, “as
well as other evidence,” supports this count as being committed within the
three-years statute of limitations period.
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the listeners, must be considered.’ We therefore cannot ignore what a victim
knows about a defendant, regardless of how it is learned, in assessing
whether a defendant’s behavior rises to the level of a credible threat.” (People
v. Uecker (2009) 172 Cal.App.4th 583, 598, fn. 10 [citation omitted], italics
added.)
Here, Rosas argues “the only evidence of the threat element of stalking”
to support count 1 were the two threatening videos he sent to Doe “in either
2019 or 2020.” And because “it is impossible” to determine from this evidence
whether he sent the videos before the October 7, 2019 “cutoff date” (boldface
omitted), “it is impossible to determine whether the action was commenced
within three years of the commission of count one and the conviction is fatally
defective.” He continues, “[w]ithout the videos the only arguable crime of
stalking is based on the evidence of text messages, which provided the threat
element of count two only.”
We reject Rosas argument because it ignores the totality of the
evidence.
The trial evidence established that Rosas was physically violent toward
Doe during their relationship. After Doe left Rosas in 2018, he began a years-
long campaign of harassment against her, including express and implied
threats to kill her and statements revealing he had been near her residence
and car. Rosas continued with this pattern of conduct despite Doe repeatedly
changing her phone number, reporting Rosas to police, and obtaining
criminal and family law protective orders against him.
Relevant to count 1, Rosas twice called Doe—once on an unknown date
in 2020 and once in June 2022—and taunted her with the fact that he had
been released from custody. His statements, given his history of violence and
threats of violence against Doe, implied he had the ability to physically access
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her. Doe testified that both calls prompted her to report them to police, and
the second call scared her. Both calls are within the three-year statute of
limitations period. Tellingly, Rosas does not mention either call in his
sufficiency of the evidence challenge.
Given Rosas’s “pattern of conduct” and the “combination of verbal,
written, or electronically communicated statements and conduct” (§ 646.9,
subd. (g)), a reasonable trier of fact could find beyond a reasonable doubt that
either or both of Rosas’s calls on these dates constituted an implied threat to
Doe’s safety. (See People v. Lopez (2015) 240 Cal.App.4th 436, 449–454
[finding sufficient evidence of credible threat for purposes of stalking under
section 646.9 was implied from defendant’s course of conduct in which he
“was obsessed with [the victim] over a period of many years, contacted her
repeatedly despite her efforts to stop him directly and through involving the
police, and made clear both that he knew where she lived and where she
went, and that he would not accept her ending what he perceived to be their
relationship”].)
On the record before us, we conclude substantial evidence supports the
jury’s verdict that Rosas committed stalking as charged in count 1, and that
he did so within the applicable statutory period.
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DISPOSITION
The judgment is affirmed.
DO, Acting P. J.
WE CONCUR:
CASTILLO, J.
RUBIN, J.
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