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Name: People v. Delgado
Case #: B240880
Court: CA Court of Appeal
District 2 DCA
Division: 6
Opinion Date: 02/25/2013
Subsequent History: opn. following rehg. 4/20/2013 (nonsubstantive changes)
Summary

A defendant who otherwise would be eligible for local incarceration under the Realignment Act, but has a prior juvenile adjudication for a serious or violent felony, is ineligible for local incarceration. Appellant was convicted of resisting an executive officer (Pen. Code, § 69) and admitted two “strikes.” Section 69 provides for imprisonment at the local level, pursuant to section 1170, subdivision (h). The trial court struck one of the “strikes,” and sentenced appellant to a six-year term, but declined to order the imposed term served locally. The court reasoned that appellant was not entitled to local incarceration because of his juvenile adjudication for a serious or violent felony, in 2008, when he was seventeen years of age. Affirmed. The Three Strikes Law, which is an initiative statute, holds that a felon with a prior “strike” shall not be committed to any facility other than state prison, and that a prior juvenile adjudication shall constitute a prior felony conviction for purposes of sentence enhancement (Pen. Code, § 667, subds. (c)(4) & (d)(3)). An initiative statute cannot be amended without voter approval, or unless it specifically provides otherwise. The Three Strikes Law provides for amendment only by “supermajority” legislation; i.e., a statute passed in each house with two-thirds of the membership concurring. Although the Realignment Act may be reasonably interpreted to exclude from a prison sentence those felons whose prior “strike” conviction resulted from a juvenile adjudication, it was passed without voter approval or two-thirds majority vote. Therefore, it will not trump the Strikes Law, and felons with a prior juvenile adjudication for a “strike” are ineligible for local custody.