The California Supreme Court affirms the convictions and Bertsch’s death sentence in this 1985 kidnap-rape-murder case but reverses Hronis’s death sentence because of post-trial changes in the law governing a defendant’s mental competency to represent himself.
The California Supreme Court reverses Omar Deen’s capital conviction and death sentence because the trial court failed to adequately examine whether a juror who had a personal connection to the murdered police chief harbored actual bias.
The California Supreme Court holds that assault is not a lesser included offense of resisting an officer by force or violence under Penal Code section 69, because resistance does not require the present ability to inflict harm.
The California Supreme Court clarifies that an unreadably small or blurry contract goes to procedural unconscionability, not substantive unconscionability — but illegibility triggers heightened scrutiny of the underlying terms for unfairness.
The California Supreme Court holds that a small amount of loose marijuana scattered on a car floor is not an open container under state law and does not give police probable cause to search the vehicle.
The California Supreme Court holds that requesters under the California Public Records Act can sometimes obtain declaratory relief even after the agency has produced everything responsive, but the statute does not impose a three-year duty to preserve records the agency has withheld as exempt.