People v. Elias

1

THE PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. MICHAEL A. CRUZ ELIAS, Defendant and Appellant.

B319595

California Court of Appeals, Second District, Third Division

May 11, 2023

NOT TO BE PUBLISHED

APPEAL from a judgment of the Superior Court of Los Angeles County No. MA078183 Robert G. Chu, Judge. Affirmed.

Richard A. Levy, under appointment by the Court of Appeal for Defendant and Appellant.

Rob Bonta, Attorney General, Lance E. Winters, Chief Assistant Attorney General, Susan Sullivan Pithey, Assistant Attorney General, Noah P. Hill and Thomas C. Hsieh, Deputy Attorneys General, for Plaintiff and Respondent.

EDMON P. J.

A jury convicted Michael A. Cruz Elias^[1] of the murder of Jose Ahumada. At trial, the killer's identity was in dispute. As to that issue, the trial court admitted evidence that Elias had participated in a shooting just weeks before Ahumada was killed and that bullets recovered from that shooting and the Ahumada shooting were fired from the same gun. On appeal Elias contends that this evidence should have been excluded or limited. He also contends that the trial court made prejudicial comments during voir dire, should have instructed the jury on voluntary manslaughter, and should have dismissed a firearm enhancement under recently enacted law. We reject all contentions and affirm the judgment.

BACKGROUND

I. The prosecution's case

A. Wendy C.'s testimony

At Elias's trial for Ahumada's murder, Wendy C. was the prosecution's main witness, and she testified under a grant of immunity. According to Wendy, she and Ahumada had met just a few months before March 2018 and would occasionally get together to drink and smoke marijuana. Although Ahumada wanted to be more than friends, Wendy refused. On the evening of March 5, 2018, Ahumada asked Wendy if she wanted to hang out. Wendy agreed but asked if her friend Elias could come with them, even though Elias and Ahumada had never met. Wendy had known Elias for about a year, and although she said they had not been intimate, she also testified that they had been intimate "[o]nly a little bit."

Ahumada picked up Wendy and Elias in his car.^[2] Wendy sat in the front passenger seat, and Elias sat in the backseat. After buying beer, they went to Ahumada's "connect's house" where he bought cocaine. Then they went to "the view," a place off of Pearblossom Highway in the mountains where they parked on a dirt road. Ahumada and Elias drank beer and snorted cocaine, and Wendy smoked marijuana.

They were all just sitting there quietly getting high and listening to music, when gunshots came from the backseat directed at Ahumada. In shock, Wendy saw blood everywhere. Ahumada was dead. At Elias's direction, Wendy helped him put Ahumada's body into the car's trunk. Elias then drove Wendy home. Wendy did not know what Elias did thereafter.

B. The investigation

The next day, March 6, 2018, the police received a report that a car had been abandoned at a location in North Hollywood that was two blocks from where Elias lived. Law enforcement recovered the car, which belonged to Ahumada. Five 9-millimeter bullets and Ahumada's cell phone with the SIM card removed were recovered from the car. Subsequent testing found Elias's DNA on the steering wheel and interior rear driver's door.^[3]

About seven months after Ahumada disappeared, his remains were discovered in a shallow grave in Lancaster near Highway 14. A medical examiner determined that he had suffered multiple gunshot wounds but could not determine the exact number of wounds. However, a sweatshirt and t-shirt recovered with the remains had five bullet holes in them.

After law enforcement posted a reward for information about Ahumada, a tip led them to Wendy. Detectives interviewed her three times. During the first interview in November 2018, Wendy initially said she and Ahumada went to the view alone a long time ago, and she denied knowing Elias. After the detective exhorted Wendy to tell the truth, Wendy began to cry and said Ahumada had tried to "force" himself on her. She also admitted she hung out with Elias "a lot." She then said a "white guy" high on cocaine was with her, Elias, and Ahumada that night at the view, the white guy and Ahumada argued, and the white guy shot Ahumada. She denied helping bury the body.

In her second interview with detectives in January 2019, Wendy at first maintained that the white guy killed Ahumada and denied that Elias was the shooter. The detectives then told Wendy that they knew there was no white guy, that Elias was the shooter, and that if she continued being dishonest then she could become an accessory to murder. Wendy then said Elias had killed Ahumada. She denied that anything happened just before Elias shot Ahumada, saying they were just doing drugs and listening to music. However, Ahumada had previously made advances at Wendy. Also, her relationship with Elias was "kinda" romantic. She didn't know if Ahumada did anything to make Elias jealous, although she agreed that Elias was the jealous type. And when asked what led to the shooting and whether "it had something to do with this guy [Ahumada] having an interest in you," Wendy said, "Maybe that."

C. Prior shooting evidence

Over a defense objection, the prosecution introduced evidence that Elias was involved in another shooting just weeks before Ahumada was murdered. Sandra Quintanilla testified that on the evening of February 16, 2018, she was at a liquor store in Palmdale with two friends she identified as Listo and Kevin. They had all been drinking. While in the store, someone got into a physical altercation with the store's clerk. Quintanilla, Listo, and Kevin left. Hours later, they were walking when a car approached them with five people inside, including the store's clerk. Hostile words were exchanged. Quintanilla challenged them to a one-on-one fight, so she briefly went home to get a knife. When she got back outside, someone from inside the car shot at them. Quintanilla saw a person in the backseat chamber a round into a handgun and hand the gun to the driver, who shot the gun.

Not long after the shooting was reported to law enforcement, an officer stopped a car matching the description of the car involved in the shooting. Four, not five, men, including Elias, were in the car. No weapons were found.

Quintanilla identified Elias as the shooter from a photographic six-pack. However, at trial, the parties stipulated that after the shooting, Quintanilla told an officer that the store clerk drove the car, and after retrieving the knife, she heard gunshots fired in her direction but did not see from where they were fired.

D. Firearm expert testimony

A firearm expert examined Ahumada's car and, based on tests using a rod to determine the trajectory of bullets, opined that the shots were fired from the backseat. The firearm expert also analyzed bullets recovered from the Quintanilla shooting and bullets recovered from Ahumada's car. He determined that they were fired from the same gun.^[4]

II. Defense evidence

A forensic psychologist testified that detectives coerced Wendy's statement implicating Elias. The expert said, "This was a very powerful session and focused on shifting Wendy from 'Mike had no involvement' to 'Mike was the shooter,' and succeeded in doing that."

III. Verdict and sentence

Elias was charged with and a jury found him guilty of second degree murder with a personal gun use allegation (Pen. Code,^[5] §§ 187, subd. (a), 12022.53, subd. (d)). On March 25, 2022, the trial court sentenced Elias to a total term of 40 years to life (15 years to life plus 25 years to life for the gun enhancement).

DISCUSSION

I. Prior shooting evidence

Elias contends that evidence he was involved in another shooting in the weeks preceding Ahumada's murder should have been excluded and that its admission violated his federal and state constitutional rights. As we now explain, we disagree.

A. Additional background

Before trial, Elias moved to exclude evidence of the prior February 2018 shooting involving Quintanilla on the grounds there was insufficient foundation, it was inadmissible under Evidence Code section 352, and admitting it would violate his state and federal constitutional rights. As to foundation, defense counsel argued that Quintanilla saw a man in the car hand Elias a gun but did not see Elias fire a gun. The prosecutor countered that it was expecting to use the evidence to negate self-defense or accident, but that it would also be admissible to establish identity, as bullets recovered from both crimes were fired from the same gun. The trial court admitted the evidence, finding that Elias's possession of a gun, even though prejudicial, was "extremely probative" and not outweighed by the probability it would consume an undue amount of time, create a danger of undue prejudice, or confuse or mislead the jury.

B. The trial court did not abuse its discretion by admitting the evidence

Only relevant evidence is admissible. (Evid. Code, § 350.) Relevant evidence is "evidence, including evidence relevant to the credibility of a witness or hearsay declarant, having any tendency in reason to prove or disprove any disputed fact that is of consequence to the determination of the action." (Id., § 210.) Generally, evidence of prior criminal acts is inadmissible to show a defendant's disposition to commit such acts. (Id., § 1101, subd. (a).) However, evidence that a person committed an uncharged crime may be admitted to prove something other than the defendant's character, such as motive, opportunity, intent, preparation, plan, knowledge, identity, or absence of mistake, as well as to attack or support the credibility of a witness. (Id., § 1101, subds. (b), (c).) Even if evidence is...