People v. Stewart

1

THE PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. JEVANTE TERRELL STEWART et al., Defendants and Appellants.

E078408

California Court of Appeals, Fourth District, Second Division

September 5, 2024

NOT TO BE PUBLISHED

APPEAL from the Superior Court of Riverside County. No. RIF1803153 Samuel Diaz, Jr., Judge. Affirmed in part, reversed in part with directions.

Joshua L. Siegel, under appointment by the Court of appeal, for Defendant and Appellant Jevante Stewart.

Cliff Gardner, under appointment by the Court of appeal, for Defendant and Appellant Lonzo Lee Ford.

Ronda G. Norris, under appointment by the Court of appeal, for Defendant and Appellant Dameontae C. Wright-Patterson.

Rob Bonta, Attorney General, Lance E. Winters, Chief Assistant Attorney General, Charles C. Ragland, Assistant Attorney General, Steve Oetting and Kristen Ramirez, Deputy Attorneys General, for Plaintiff and Respondent.

OPINION

FIELDS J.

I. INTRODUCTION

In 2021, defendants and appellants Jevante Terrell Stewart Lonzo Lee Ford, and Dameontae C. Wright-Patterson, were tried before the same jury and found guilty of the first degree murder of Curtis McDaniel. (Pen. Code, §§ 187, subd. (a), 189.^[1]) The jury also found gang sentencing enhancement allegations (§ 186.22, subd. (b)) and gangmurder special circumstance allegations (§ 190.22, subd. (a)(22)) true against each defendant. The evidence showed that defendants drove to McDaniel's house on September 16, 2017, and shot and killed McDaniel in retaliation for a September 15, 2017 shooting at a member of defendants' gang by members of a rival gang associated with McDaniel's son.

Each defendant was also convicted of possessing a firearm as a felon at the time of the McDaniel shooting. (§ 29800, subd. (a); counts 2 [Stewart], 3 [Stewart] 4 [Wright-Patterson].) As to Ford, the jury found that a principal in the murder personally and intentionally discharged a firearm causing McDaniel's death. (§ 12022.53, subd. (e)(1).) As to Stewart and Wright-Patterson, the jury found the same firearm allegation not true. Based on the gang-murder special circumstance findings, each defendant was sentenced to life without the possibility of parole (LWOP) for the murder.

In this appeal, defendants raise multiple claims of error and join each other's contentions. We reverse the true findings on the gang enhancement allegations and gang-murder special circumstance findings, based on instructional error. Accordingly, we remand the matter to the trial court to allow the People the opportunity to retry these allegations, and for full resentencing, regardless of whether the allegations are retried or the results of any retrial. We affirm the judgments in all other respects.

II. BACKGROUND

A. The McDaniel Shooting

Around 4:00 p.m. on September 15, 2017, in the city of Hemet, Brandon Lawton, a high-ranking member of the Four Corner Hustler Crips ("4CHC") gang known as "Menace," was a passenger in his mother's car when another car pulled up and opened fire, striking the car four times. No suspects in the Lawton shooting were identified, but law enforcement officers and 4CHC gang members believed the shooter was a member of the NAW ("n . . . s always with it") gang, a rival gang of the 4CHC gang.

Around 9:30 p.m. on September 16, 2017, the day after the Lawton shooting, McDaniel and his partner C.S. were in their house (McDaniel's house) in the city of Perris with their 11-year-old daughter and a younger granddaughter. The house was in NAW gang territory. The couple's 21- or 22-year-old son was associated with the NAW gang and lived in the home before he was sentenced to prison in June 2017. The son's car was parked in the driveway. The front door of the house was open, but the screened security door was closed.

C.S. and the children were upstairs when C.S. heard gunshots. C.S. came downstairs and found McDaniel lying on the living room floor. McDaniel had been shot by a single .45-caliber bullet which lodged in the front right side of his neck. He died from the wound on September 21, after he was taken off life support.

On the street in front of McDaniel's house, officers found five semiautomatic cartridge casings, including one .45-caliber casing and four .380-caliber casings. There was a single bullet hole in the front security door and bullet strike marks on McDaniel's house and his son's car. Surveillance video footage from the house across the street showed two persons walking toward McDaniel's house immediately before McDaniel was shot, but the persons' races, ages, and other characteristics were not visible in the video.

K.P. and his daughter, T.P., lived "just around the corner" and two to four houses down the street from McDaniel's house. Moments after the shooting, K.P. arrived at McDaniel's house and tried to help C.S. stop McDaniel from bleeding by holding towels against McDaniel's wound. In front of McDaniel's house, K.P. and T.P. spoke with the first deputy who arrived at the scene of the McDaniel shooting, and they briefly described what they had seen.

B. Ford is Found in Possession of the .380 Handgun Used in the McDaniel Shooting

On September 20, 2017, four days after the McDaniel shooting, officers conducted a traffic stop of a Cadillac occupied by driver Devaughn M. and passengers Lawton and Ford. When the Cadillac stopped, Ford fled on foot from the rear passenger seat, but Devaughn M. and Lawton stayed in the car. Ford was found hiding in the yard of a nearby residence and was detained without incident.

Eight to 10 feet from the Cadillac, in the area where Ford had fled, officers found a loaded Ruger LCP .380 firearm. Based on his possession of the .380 firearm on September 20, 2017, Ford pleaded guilty to active gang participation (§ 186.22, subd. (a)) and unlawful possession of a firearm (§ 29800, subd. (a)), and admitted he possessed the firearm for the benefit of a criminal street gang (former § 186.22, subd. (b).) In April 2018, ballistics tests were completed and showed that the .380-caliber firearm found in Ford's possession on September 20 was the firearm that shot the .380-caliber casings found at the scene of the September 16 McDaniel shooting.

C. Defendants' Law Enforcement Contacts and 4CHC Gang Membership Admissions

1. Contacts with Stewart

On January 3, 2017, during a traffic stop in San Jacinto, Stewart admitted he was a 4CHC gang member and his moniker was "Four Bang." During a traffic stop on September 21, Stewart again admitted he was a 4CHC member, but he said his moniker was "Taz." An officer testified that gang members may use multiple monikers or change their monikers over time.

At the time of the September 21, 2017 traffic stop, Stewart was a passenger in a beige Infiniti, and the driver, J.M., was a 4CHC member on active parole. The Infiniti was not registered to Stewart. Photos taken at the September 21 traffic stop showed the Infiniti, its license plate number, and Stewart with 4CHC gang tattoos.

On October 15 or 25, 2017, Stewart was stopped while driving a silver Infiniti (not the beige Infinity he was riding in on September 21, 2017) and, during this stop, Stewart again admitted he was a 4CHC member with the moniker "Taz." On October 2 and October 26, 2017, Stewart received traffic citations while driving the silver Infiniti. Records generated by a mobile license plate reader showed that, on May 25, 2017, the silver Infiniti was five or six houses away from McDaniel's house.

In an April 20, 2018 traffic stop, Stewart again admitted he was a 4CHC member with the moniker "Taz." Photos taken at the April 20 traffic stop showed Stewart had 4CHC gang tattoos.

2. Contacts with Wright-Patterson

On January 9, 2018, Wright-Patterson told a Hemet police officer he was a 4CHC member and his moniker was "Marlin Blue." That day, Wright-Patterson was taken to a hospital to be treated for injuries he sustained while resisting arrest. When interviewed, Wright-Patterson initially denied, but later admitted, having a gun in his possession at the time of his January 9 arrest. Wright-Patterson was arrested based on reports that a man matching his description was armed and "trying to get into cars." Wright-Patterson had no gang-related tattoos.

3. Contacts with Ford

Following a May 4, 2018 traffic stop, Ford was arrested and charged with two counts of attempted murder. Ford was found riding in a vehicle that matched the description of a vehicle used in a drive-by shooting earlier that day in which two persons were shot. Three other people were in the vehicle, and a firearm was found in the vehicle. During a police interview, Ford admitted he was the shooter in the May 4 drive-by shooting; he knew he shot two people; he was trying to kill one of them because that person had disrespected the mother of his child; and he obtained the gun found in the car a few days earlier after he was released from jail. Ford also said he was a member of the 4CHC and his moniker was "Zo." Photos of Ford's neck and hands, showing his 4CHC gang tattoos, were admitted into evidence. The jury also heard that Ford was on probation in two other criminal cases at the time of his May 2018 arrest on two attempted murder charges.

D. Defendants' Social Media Records

During the investigation of the McDaniel shooting, officers obtained records from social media accounts associated with defendants and other 4CHC gang members. A social media post dated May 17, 2017 from Ford's social media account showed a photo of Ford holding a firearm and indicated that Ford's gang moniker was "BG Menace." An online message dated September 11, 2017 showed Ford told Lawton (Menace) that NAW gang members had been "ridin' around" in 4CHC territory, that Ford and Wright-Patterson would be in 4CHC...