P. v. Mau
Defendant Michael Mau, a member of the South Side Tracy subset of the Norteño street gang, was thrown out of a nightclub for fighting. Moments later, he fired a handgun through the door of the nightclub, killing one person and injuring six.
A jury convicted defendant of second degree murder, six counts of attempted murder, and shooting into an occupied building, all with enhancements for benefitting a gang and personal use of a firearm causing death or great bodily injury. Defendant was also convicted of various firearm offenses and being an active gang participant. He was sentenced to 254 years and 8 months to life in prison.
On appeal, defendant does not challenge his convictions on the substantive offenses, but limits his contentions to issues involving the gang allegations. He contends there is insufficient evidence to support the gang enhancements, and also that he received ineffective assistance of counsel based on trial counsel’s failure to object to the gang expert (1) offering an opinion on the ultimate fact or (2) recounting 29 incidents of defendant’s contact with law enforcement.
Defendant also raises three sentencing errors--the People concede error on two. Defendant and the People agree that it was error to impose a 10-year gang enhancement on his murder count and on the charge of shooting at an occupied building. Defendant further contends the trial court erred in calculating his sentence on count VIII--shooting at an occupied building.
We shall modify defendant’s sentence and otherwise affirm. As we will explain, sufficient evidence supports the gang enhancements and defendant did not receive ineffective assistance of counsel. We agree with the parties regarding the two sentencing errors and shall affirm the calculation of defendant’s sentence on count VIII.
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