California v. Zamora Docket: G059259 (Fourth Appellate District), Opinion Date: January 14, 2022. Israel Gutierrez Zamora was convicted on multiple charges, including attempted kidnapping and assault with a semiautomatic weapon. He petitioned for disclosure of juror identifying information pursuant to Code of Civil Procedure section 237. After denying the disclosure petition as untimely, the trial court sentenced Zamora to a total term of 98 years to life. Zamora then filed an appeal challenging the denial of his petition for disclosure; he also argued there were errors in his sentence and the abstract of judgment. As a result of that first appeal, the Court of Appeal reversed the order denying the petition, as well as the challenged aspects of the sentence and abstract, and remanded the case with directions. On remand, the court denied Zamora’s disclosure petition on the merits, and corrected the sentence and abstract as directed. Zamora appealed that second order which denied his disclosure petition, arguing that the court was statutorily required to release the identifying information for jurors who did not object to disclosure. Zamora also challenged additional aspects of his sentence that were imposed when the court resentenced him following remand, arguing he was entitled to the benefit of recent changes in the law that rendered certain sentence enhancements. The Court of Appeal found that section 237 obligated the trial court to release the information only if none of the jurors protested the disclosure. "If any juror does object, the court must sustain the objection if it concludes the motion fails to show good cause for the release. That is what occurred in this case. Six of the twelve jurors objected to disclosure, which triggered the court’s obligation to determine whether there was good cause for disclosure. After concluding there was not, the court properly denied the petition." The Attorney General agreed that the challenged enhancements had to be stricken, rather than stayed. To this, the Court of Appeal concurred and remanded the case to the trial court with directions to strike those sentence enhancements. #strikeenhancements #caseremanded #appellatecourt
Enhancements Ordered Stricken on Remand
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