skip to Main Content
Name: People v. Toussain
Case #: G050210
Court: CA Court of Appeal
District 4 DCA
Division: 3
Opinion Date: 09/29/2015
Summary

Penal Code section 3000.08 requires parole supervision for all registered sex offenders released from prison regardless of their current commitment offense if CDCR has classified them as “high-risk.” In 2013, Toussain was convicted of failing to register as a sex offender based on his 1989 conviction for assault with intent to commit rape. After he was paroled in 2014, a parole revocation petition was filed alleging that Toussain violated parole by tampering with his GPS tracking device. The petition also alleged that Toussain’s sex offender risk category was “high.” The trial court dismissed the petition for lack of jurisdiction, finding that Toussain had not been in prison for a crime triggering parole supervision under section 3000.08. The People appealed. Held: Reversed. Section 3000.08 provides that “[a] person released from state prison prior to or on or after July 1, 2013, after serving a prison term . . . for any of the following crimes is subject to parole supervision by [CDCR] . . . (4) Any crime for which the person is classified as a high-risk sex offender. . . .” Applying rules of statutory construction, the Court of Appeal rejected Toussain’s argument that parole supervision is required only when the offender’s most recent prison commitment is for a crime for which the person was classified as a high-risk sex offender. After reviewing the statutory scheme and CDCR regulations and policies, the court also concluded that section 3000.08, subdivision (a)(4) requires parole supervision for all registered sex offenders that CDCR has classified as high risk based on the person’s State Authorized Risk Assessment Tool for Sex Offenders (SARATSO) test score. Here, at the pleading stage, there was no evidence that CDCR improperly classified Toussain as a high-risk sex offender. The trial court erred in dismissing the petition.