California v. Campbell
Annotate this CaseDefendant-appellant Aaron Campbell met Silvester Leyva at a hookah bar where they exchanged telephone numbers and discussed buying and selling marijuana. A few days later, Campbell and defendant and appellant Xavier Fort, among others, went to Leyva’s house to obtain marijuana. Leyva and his friend, Samuel De La Torre, met Campbell in Leyva’s front yard. After De La Torre handed marijuana to Campbell, Campbell pulled a gun and began to back away toward two waiting vehicles. Fort, who was standing near the vehicles, fired his gun in the direction of the house. Leyva was killed by one of the bullets. A jury convicted defendants of first degree murder and found true a robbery special-circumstance allegation. The jury also convicted them of two counts of robbery based upon the taking of the marijuana. In one robbery count, Leyva was the victim; in the other, De La Torre was the victim. Regarding the murder charge, the jury was instructed on first degree felony murder only, with robbery as the underlying felony. On appeal, Fort argued that the trial court had a sua sponte duty to instruct on lesser included offenses. The Court of Appeal agreed: there was substantial evidence from which a reasonable jury could conclude that a lesser offense, but not the greater, was committed. Therefore, the court erred by failing to instruct the jury as to lesser included offenses. Because the error was not harmless, Fort’s murder conviction was reversed. Because the instructional error may have led the jury to convict Fort of the robbery counts, the conviction on those counts was also reversed. In the nonpublished portion of its opinion, the Court of Appeal rejected defendants’ argument that the evidence was insufficient to support their convictions of the robbery of Leyva.
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