Under Penal Code section 667.6, subdivision(c), which authorizes imposition of a full consecutive sentence for specified sexual assaults, the court must identify criteria justifying the harsher sentence. Appellant was convicted of rape and forcible lewd and lascivious behavior on a child under the age of 14 years. The offenses occurred during a single incident. The court sentenced him to 15 years to life for the rape plus a full-term, three-year consecutive sentence for the lewd and lascivious conviction, finding the consecutive sentences appropriate because of the basis of appellant’s previous sexual misconduct; the child’s age in conjunction with her cordial relationship with defendant as a neighbor, such that she had no reason to fear him; and that appellant at age 48 years was old enough to know the damage done to a 13-year-old child who was raped. The court noted that appellant forfeited the claim that the trial court failed to make a separate statement as to imposition of the full-term consecutive sentence. Regardless, the trial court’s reasoning for a consecutive sentence adequately illustrated that it reasonably viewed appellant as the type of more serious sex offender for which section 667.6, subdivsion (c) was designed. (People v. Osband (1996) 13 Cal.4th 622.).
Case Summaries