People v. Bulkin CA5

INTRODUCTION

Appellant Keith Jeffery Bulkin and his crime partner Thomas Bacigalupi went into a Sonora grocery store where each attempted to use counterfeit $50 bills to buy small items and get legitimate cash in change. After the store employees rejected them, the two took their bills back, used other money for their purchases, and left the store. The store manager called police who quickly stopped their car nearby. A search of the car and the two men uncovered 39 counterfeit $50 bills, along with property and receipts for numerous recent purchases — including returns for cash refunds — that had been made in a trail throughout the Bay Area and Central California.1 A jury convicted Bulkin of felony conspiracy (Pen. Code,2 § 182, subd. (a)(1); count 1), misdemeanor passing a fictitious bill (§ 476; count 2),3 and felony possession of counterfeit bills worth more than $950 (§§ 475, subd. (a) & 473; count 3). Bulkin separately admitted a 2006 burglary conviction that had been alleged as a strike. (§§ 667, subd. (d) and 1170.12, subd. (b).) However, nothing other than the date and Contra Costa County location of that prior conviction was alleged or admitted, and thus no details or…