Custody Credits Accrue as to Each Case Even if Global Plea

Friday, June 26, 2026

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California Supreme Court:

Custody Credits Accrue as to Each Case Even if Global Plea

Opinion Says Sentencing Defendant to Concurrent Terms on Multiple Matters at One Hearing Does Not Open Door to Reducing Incarceration Period by Time Served Across All Cases

By Kimber Cooley, associate editor

The California Supreme Court held yesterday that a defendant is not entitled to share credit for time spent in custody awaiting resolution of five separate cases across all matters simply because he enters a global plea and is sentenced to concurrent terms at a single sentencing hearing, resolving a split among the courts of appeal as to how to interpret the governing statutory scheme.

At issue is Penal Code §2900.5, which provides that “[w]hen the defendant has been in custody,…all days…shall be credited upon his or her term of imprisonment” and, in subdivision (b), specifies:

“[C]redit shall be given only where the custody to be credited is attributable to proceedings related to the same conduct for which the defendant has been convicted. Credit shall be given only once for a single period of custody attributable to multiple offenses for which a consecutive sentence is imposed.”

Chief Justice Patricia Guerrero authored yesterday’s unanimous opinion, declaring that the Sixth District Court of Appeal erred in ruling that the resolution of the five cases through a single sentencing hearing converted the matters into consolidated “proceedings related to the same conduct” for purposes of §2900.5(b). She wrote:

“The expediency of resolving all five of defendant’s cases under one plea bargain and at a single sentencing hearing did not transform multiple cases into one proceeding for purposes of awarding custody credits pursuant to section 2900.5(b).”

String of Burglaries

Seeking the broad application of credit was Christopher Cofer, who was charged with a string of burglaries in multiple cases filed between September 2020 and February 2021. He was in and out of custody during the time period after being released on his own recognizance in some matters and posting bail in others.

He was eventually remanded to jail on three of the cases in August 2021, but his status as “released on his own recognizance” remained in effect in two others.

On Jan. 26, 2022, Cofer pled no contest to felony second-degree burglary charges in three of the matters, as well as to misdemeanor charges in the remaining two, and was remanded into custody on all cases. Two months later, Monterey Superior Court Judge Stephanie E. Hulsey sentenced him to six years in prison on one matter, and shorter concurrent terms in the others, carefully apportioning custody credit only as to the cases for which the time was served.

After the sentence was imposed, Hulsey denied Cofer’s request to correct the presentence credits, citing the 2013 opinion by the Sixth District in People v. Jacobs, which held that a defendant sentenced in two separate criminal matters at a single hearing was entitled to credit only for custody related to the specific case for which the time was served.

A different panel of the Sixth District Court of Appeal reversed Cofer’s judgment in a divided opinion.

Declining to follow Jacobs, the majority said that it found persuasive the 2012 decision by this district’s Div. Six in People v. Kunath, which held that, “when concurrent sentences are imposed at the same time for unrelated crimes, the defendant is entitled to presentence custody credits on each sentence,” saying that interpretation is “more consistent with the purposes of awarding presentence credit” and “is not foreclosed by any Supreme Court authority.”

Guerrero remarked that “[w]e granted review to address the apparent conflict between Jacobs and Cofer” and declared that “we disapprove People v. Kunath…to the extent that it is inconsistent with this opinion.”

Statutory Language

Turning to the language of §2900.5, the chief justice noted that “[w]e have interpreted section 2900.5 on multiple occasions” and “[o]ur prior decisions have articulated a ‘strict causation’ rule for the award of custody credits” under which “custody will not be credited…absent a showing that the conduct that underlies the term to be credited” was a “but for” cause of the detention at stake.

Acknowledging that those cases “all concerned multiple proceedings that were resolved at separate hearings,” she said that “we return to the statute” to answer “how the statutory requirement that presentence custody be ‘attributable to proceedings related to the same conduct for which the defendant has been convicted’…applies in a case like this.”

Pointing out that the statute does not define “proceedings,” she turned to the meaning attributed to the term by Black’s Law Dictionary, which provides that the word means “[t]he regular and orderly progression of a lawsuit, including all acts and events between the time of commencement and the entry of judgment.”

Reasoning that the ordinary meaning supports the court’s interpretation of the term as “referring to a specific legal action filed against a criminal defendant—in other words, a criminal case,” she continued:

“Further examination of the statute’s language corroborates this interpretation…Subdivision (b) limits credits ‘only’ to custody that ‘is attributable to proceedings related to the same conduct for which the defendant has been convicted.’…This language connecting custody time to ‘proceedings related to the same conduct’ reinforces that ‘proceedings’…is concerned with separate cases arising from distinct acts and arrests, not a sentencing hearing.”

No Sensible Reading

Saying that “it is not sensible to regard this custody time as somehow ‘attributable to’…the joint sentencing hearing that came only after custody time was served,” she commented that “[n]or are we persuaded by defendant’s argument that an interpretation of ‘proceedings’…as concerned with individual cases would improperly elevate form over substance.” She said:

“[A]s the Attorney General observes, defendant’s ‘custody status in his various cases was…the product of how the separate proceedings unfolded in light of the court’s rulings and the parties’ litigating positions.’ And in critiquing one perceived technicality, defendant’s argument for receiving additional credits relies wholly on the fact that, for whatever reason, his cases happened to be sentenced at the same hearing.”

Addressing the assertion by the Court of Appeal that its interpretation of §2900.5(b) ensures “equal treatment between defendant and individuals who could afford bail on additional cases,” she said:

“[D]efendant still received credit in the appropriate cases for all of the time he spent in custody; he is simply not receiving credit in all of his cases for the days he served in any of them merely because he was sentenced in all of the cases at the same hearing. The policy rationale given by the Court of Appeal majority does not justify an additional award of credits that would contravene the text and plain meaning of section 2900.5, subdivision (b).”

She declared:

“In sum, we interpret the term ‘proceedings,’ as used in section 2900.5, subdivision (b), as synonymous with a criminal case. As such,…presentence credit that is to be applied must be attributable to the criminal case in which a defendant is being sentenced….As applied here, the trial court correctly interpreted the statute in awarding presentence custody credits to defendant’s sentences; the Court of Appeal majority did not.”

The case is People v. Cofer, 2026 S.O.S. 1829.