 |
 |
to fill out a simple form to connect to DUI Lawyers in your area.
|
|
|
|
|
People v. Diaz2/17/2004
Defendant Saul Mora Diaz appeals from a judgment entered following his plea of no contest to one count of driving under the influence of alcohol and causing injury and one count of hit and run resulting in injury. The trial court denied probation and sentenced defendant to two years and four months in state prison. On appeal, defendant contends that he received ineffective assistance of counsel because his attorney failed to object to the court's reasons for denying probation. Defendant also contends that the trial court erred when it proceeded to set the amount of victim restitution at a hearing where defendant did not have the services of a Spanish interpreter. We shall affirm.
A. FACTS
The facts are taken from the probation report. On October 11, 2002 defendant drove into an intersection and broad sided another vehicle that had just entered the intersection. Defendant's car then crashed into two parked cars. The vehicle defendant first hit rolled over and landed on top of two little boys who had been playing nearby. The boys were seriously hurt, as was the driver of the first car defendant struck. Defendant walked away from the scene and was detained by witnesses. His blood alcohol content is reported to have been 0.23 percent.
The district attorney charged defendant with driving under the influence and causing bodily injury to another (Veh.Code, § 23153, subd. (a), count 1), driving with a blood alcohol of 0.08 percent or more and causing bodily injury to another (Veh.Code, § 23153, subd. (b), count 2), and hit and run accident resulting in injury to another (Veh.Code, § 20001, subd. (a), count 3). Counts 1 and 2 contained the allegations that defendant had personally inflicted great bodily injury and had inflicted injury upon three victims. (Pen.Code, § 12022.7; Veh.Code, § 23558.)
Defendant pled no contest to counts 1 and 3 and admitted the enhancement allegations. The court referred the matter to the probation department for a pre-sentence report.
The probation report indicates that defendant is 32 years old. Defendant had been educated through high school in Mexico. He now lives in Salinas with his wife and her children. Defendant had been employed by the same company since 1993, earning $3,000 per month at the time of his arrest. He had no criminal history and there was no evidence of his having any prior problems with drugs or alcohol. Defendant admitted to drinking two or three beers per month. He was attending Alcoholics Anonymous and was extremely remorseful for the injuries he caused.
The probation report recommended probation conditioned upon time in the county jail. The trial court rejected the recommendation. Because the context of the trial court's reasoning is important to the following discussion, we quote at length from the court's statement:
"It's a very difficult case because there are good arguments to be made on both sides of the question.
"And as we have been here many times before, the subject of drinking and driving and the nature of this offense, driving while intoxicated, is a little bit different from most other criminal offenses in that, with most offenses, there is a criminal objective.... [ ] With drinking and driving where somebody is injured, there is no element of the offense of an intention to hurt someone.... [ ] And the strange thing about drunk driving is that the act is exactly the same, driving while intoxicated, and sometimes you get away with it and sometimes the exact same act results in injury.... [ ] So we come here always in this context, with the offender all dressed up and sorry. There just isn't any other rational way to approach these cases other than to say, if you drive drunk and you're unlucky and somebody else gets hurt, somebody else gets killed, you're going to s
Page 1 2 3 4 5 California DUI Attorneys
DUI Lawyers
|
| |
to fill out a simple form to connect to DUI Lawyers in your area.
|
|