Friday, April 10, 2026
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Clerical Error as to Prison Time Does Not Open Door to Change Misdemeanor Sentences—C.A.
Opinion Says Judge Exceeded Authority in Amending County Jail Time on Lesser Offenses at Hearing Held to Correct Calculation of Prison Penalty for Related Felony Charges
By a MetNews Staff Writer
Div. One of the Fourth District Court of Appeal has held that a trial judge erred in modifying sentences imposed on misdemeanor counts during a post-judgment hearing held to correct purely clerical errors relating to the amount of prison time imposed on felony charges, saying the jurist exceeded her authority by effectively resentencing the defendant without statutory authority.
In an opinion written by Justice Julia C. Kelety, filed March 23 and certified for publication on Wednesday, the court declared:
“Because the error…was a clerical one, the court…was not required to conduct full resentencing….However, the court went beyond its authority to correct the clerical error and made impermissible modifications to the…misdemeanor sentences. We vacate this portion of the order and remand with instructions so that the abstract can once more be amended to correctly reflect the…sentence.”
Acting Presiding Justice William Dato and Justice Jose S. Castillo joined in the opinion.
The question arose after Victor Sanchez was found guilty by a jury in August 2016 of multiple felony and misdemeanor charges relating to two assaults, one on his wife and a later incident where he allegedly fired shots at a neighbor with whom he suspected his spouse was having an affair.
State Prison Sentence
Sanchez was sentenced to state prison for an aggregate term of 38 years and four months on the felonies—including domestic violence, attempted voluntary manslaughter, and shooting at an occupied dwelling—plus three consecutive county jail terms adding up to a total of two years and six months for misdemeanor drug charges.
In 2018, Div. One reversed the judgment on direct appeal as to the conviction for discharging a firearm at an inhabited dwelling, finding that the defendant’s confession tying him to that crime was inadmissible, and remanded for further proceedings. The court otherwise affirmed the judgment.
On May 24, 2019, Riverside Superior Court Judge Eric A. Keen revisited the sentence, and a minute order specified that he was to serve “a total term of 35 years and [six] months” in state prison, having inadvertently added the county jail penalty to what should have been a 33-year prison plus two years and six-months in county jail.
An employee of the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation caught the mistake and sent a letter to Keen, noting that “the Abstract of Judgment and/or Minute Order may be in error, or incomplete [because of] references to misdemeanor counts.”
A hearing was set to address the issue, and Sanchez filed a motion under the 1996 California Supreme Court case of People v. Superior Court (Romero), seeking to eliminate a strike allegation that increased his penalty. On Sept. 18, 2024, Riverside Superior Court Judge Joshlyn R. Pulliam, denied the Romero motion, noting that the case did not involve “an illegal sentence that would warrant a complete resentencing.”
However, the jurist proceeded to vacate the sentence as to the misdemeanor counts and resentenced the defendant to three concurrent terms of 180 days in county jail. Sanchez appealed, arguing that he was entitled to full resentencing.
Deprived of Jurisdiction
Kelety noted that generally a trial court is deprived of jurisdiction to resentence a defendant once execution of the penalty has begun but pointed out that an exception exists recognizing the ability to fix clerical errors in the abstract of judgment. In such circumstances, a judge is authorized only to correct the mistake, and the defendant is not entitled to a full reconsideration of his sentence based on broader changes to the legal landscape.
Rejecting Sanchez’s assertion that the error in his case was legal rather than clerical, the justice remarked:
“We are not persuaded. It is clear from the 2019 minute order that the court never intended to sentence Sanchez to state prison on misdemeanor charges. Instead, a simple math error occurred when either the court or the clerk failed to distinguish between time imposed on felonies (to be served in state prison) and time imposed on misdemeanors (to be served in county jail), in stating the total time imposed to be served in state prison. The error in the resulting abstract reflected this rudimentary math error.”
She added:
“In the 2024 hearing, the court’s only role was to ensure that the abstract reflected the felony terms of 33 years in prison. This did not trigger a right to full resentencing. Accordingly, we do not reach Sanchez’s further argument as to the court’s denial of his Romero motion….”
Misdemeanor Sentence
Turning to the misdemeanor sentence, she said:
“[T]he court [in 2024] chose to reduce the time imposed on two of the misdemeanor counts (from the imposed terms of one year each to six months each) and to make all of them concurrent, rather than consecutive, to all other counts. The People contend that in doing so, the court exceeded its jurisdictional authority and that we should therefore vacate this portion of the sentence.”
Agreeing with the lawyers from the Attorney General’s office, Kelety commented that “sentence modifications beyond clerical corrections require an authorization set forth in a statute.” She opined:
“There was no formal recommendation for recall from the secretary of the department of corrections, nor did the court recall the sentence, so Penal Code section 1172.1 did not entitle him to resentencing….Further, the sentence was legally permissible, foreclosing any possible authority under the unauthorized sentence doctrine….Sanchez was not entitled to resentencing under Penal Code section 1172.6, nor does anything in Penal Code section 1170 provide a basis for the court to resentence on its own motion.”
Sanchez pointed to language in the letter from the corrections department indicating that “the trial court is entitled to reconsider all sentencing choices,” but the jurist declared that the language “does not change our analysis.”
She added:
“We further note that the People did not argue before the trial court that it lacked authority to modify the terms of Sanchez’s misdemeanor convictions. However, a legal error at sentencing that is both obvious and correctable without requiring further proceedings is not subject to forfeiture….Further, where the court lacks jurisdiction to modify a final sentence, a resentencing is void….As the People note, simply dismissing the appeal would leave intact the void judgment….So that the judgment in this matter correctly reflects the lawful 2019 sentence, we must vacate the portions of the court’s order that modified the misdemeanor terms and ran them concurrently.”
Kelety declared:
“The 2024 order is reversed insofar as it modified the misdemeanor sentences imposed in 2019. That portion of the order is void. In all other respects, the order is affirmed.”
The case is People v. Sanchez, D085325.
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