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Court of Appeal:
Day-of-Trial Substitution of Attorney Wrongfully Denied
Delay That Would Have Been Caused by Bringing in New Lawyer Did Not Justify Denying Defendant in Murder Case of His Choice of Counsel, Justice Aaron Says in Opinion Reversing a Conviction
By a MetNews Staff Writer
Div. One of the Fourth District Court of Appeal yesterday reversed a first-degree murder conviction because the judge presiding over the jury trial declined to let a new lawyer into the case to represent the defendant in light of the delay that would result in a case that had been lingering for two years.
Justice Cynthia Aaron wrote the opinion. It criticizes San Diego Superior Court Judge Brad A. Weinreb for not delaying proceedings so that Anthony Byron Williams’s chosen attorney, Gloria Linden Collins, could tend to other trial work and get up to speed in Willliams’s case.
“[W]e conclude that the trial court erred in permitting expedience to take precedence over Williams’s right to be represented by counsel of his choice under the circumstances of this case,” Aaron wrote.
On the morning of Sept. 3, 2019—the day set for the trial to begin—Collins made a motion to take over the defense from Deputy Public Defender Adelaida Lopez, who spoke in favor of the motion being granted. Williams had earlier made a Marsden motion, which Weinreb denied, to replace Lopez with another court-appointed attorney based on a breakdown in communications between him and Lopez.
In the meantime, Williams’s mother had raised the money to hire a Collins, a rancher and part-time criminal defense attorney who had been a prosecutor for 25 years.
In the colloquy between Weinreb and Collins, there were references to delaying the case for four months and to two months.
Weinreb’s Ruling
The judge ruled:
“After hearing from all counsel, reviewing the pleadings, and reviewing the appropriate case law, I think that counsel coming in on the day of trial is untimely….
“[I]t’s a two-year-old case, scheduled to go forward today. Counsel coming in on the day of trial after in limines have been done, saying: I’m coming on board, but I don’t know anything about the discovery. At this point in time, the court’s not going to — the court’s going to find that’s simply untimely at this point in time….
“I think it’s dilatory; I think it’s untimely. Even if it wasn’t untimely, the additional time being requested by counsel I think is unreasonable.”
Aaron’s Opinion
Aaron said in yesterday’s opinion:
“[W]hile the court stated that Williams’s request was ‘dilatory,’ the court pointed to no circumstances to support such a finding, the People have identified no such circumstances, and our own searching review of the record has produced no evidentiary support for the finding. Not only is there no evidence that Williams’s motion represented an effort to cause delay, there is undisputed evidence, recounted below, that Williams’s motion to substitute counsel was made soon after the denial of the Marsden motion, as soon as his mother was able to obtain the funds necessary to retain Collins, and reflected a genuine desire on Williams’s part to replace his appointed counsel.”
The justice went on to say:
“[A]lthough the case had been pending for approximately two years, given the seriousness of the charge and the potential sentence of life in prison without parole for Williams, we see nothing that suggests that the case was proceeding at an unduly slow pace, and certainly nothing indicating that any delay in the resolution of the case was attributable to any gamesmanship on Williams’s part or to any improper tactics on the part of his counsel.”
She noted that Williams’s mother retained Collins on Aug. 28 and that she notified Weinreb’s courtroom clerk that day of the intended substitution.
Prosecution Not Prejudiced
The prosecution, which opposed delaying the proceedings, failed to show such prejudice as to justify denying Williams having the lawyer of his choice, Aaron declared.
She said at the outset of the opinion:
“The right to counsel, enshrined in both the federal and state constitutions, guarantees a defendant the right to retain counsel of the defendant’s own choosing….The California Supreme Court has repeatedly applied this principle in reversing judgments in cases in which a defendant’s right to counsel of choice was unconstitutionally abridged….These cases make clear that while a criminal defendant’s right to counsel of choice is not absolute, that right may be overridden only under narrow, compelling, and specifically delineated circumstances….It is also clearly established that a violation of a defendant’s right to counsel of choice is per se reversible.”
Collins said yesterday she “expected” a reversal based on Weinreb declining to allow her to replace Lopez, relating:
“I told the mother, ‘This is your appeal error.’ ”
She remarked that Weinreb’s ruling was “kind of arbitrary,” adding:
“Some of those older judges are irracible types.”
Weinreb, a former California deputy attorney general, is 54.
Jury’s Verdicts
A jury on Sept. 11, 2019, found Williams, then 22, guilty of murdering Bernaldo Ramires, 19, on June 5, 2017, and of maliciously discharging a firearm from a motor vehicle. It found true a firearm allegation, and Weinreb found a strike allegation to be true.
The victim of the drive-by shooting was washing his car in front of his Oceanside home. Williams, who was not a gang member, had encountered problems with gangs and went out looking for a gang menber to kill, mistaking Ramires for being one.
Weinreb sentenced him to life imprisonment without possibility of parole.
The case is People v. Williams, 2021 S.O.S. 964.
Copyright 2021, Metropolitan News Company