People v. Rodriguez CA2/4

INTRODUCTION

Appellant Jovany Rodriguez (Rodriguez) was convicted of murder and attempted murder in 2010. Rodriguez twice petitioned for resentencing under former Penal Code section 1170.95,1 which has since been renumbered as section 1172.6. (Stats. 2018, ch. 1015, § 4; Stats. 2022, ch. 58, § 10.) The trial court denied the first petition in 2020, and the second in 2023. The present appeal is from the second denial. We conclude Rodriguez is ineligible for relief under section 1172.6 and therefore affirm.

FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND

On the afternoon of January 7, 2006, two cars pulled up next to each other at an intersection in Los Angeles. One was a white sport utility vehicle, occupied by Miguel Padilla (Padilla), Patricia Quiroa (Quiroa), and Denise Rivera. The other was a gray car with tinted windows, occupied by three individuals and positioned on the passenger side of the white vehicle. Someone from the gray car fired a gun at the white car, killing Padilla and wounding Quiroa. Testimony from Quiroa and a ballistics expert established that bullets traveled from the driver’s side of the gray car through the front passenger window of the white car; four casings were…