People v. Martinez CA1/4

I. BACKGROUND2

On March 12, 2024, Concord Police Department Detective David Petty and his colleagues executed a search warrant on a car belonging to Don Mallari based on a domestic violence incident ten days earlier. The warrant authorized searches for any guns on Mallari’s person or in his car or residence.

1 Undesignated statutory references are to the Penal Code. 2 The facts are taken from the preliminary hearing transcript.

1 The victim told police that Mallari had attacked her in his apartment ten days earlier, beating her and threatening her with a semiautomatic pistol with an extended magazine. Mallari also kept a rifle behind his bed, and she had seen his roommate and friends carrying guns in his apartment around two weeks before the assault. The victim said that she knew the roommate by the name Sus. Police officers located Mallari’s parked car in his building’s gated lot. Around 7:00 p.m. they saw him get in the car with another man, later identified as Martinez, and drive away. Detective Petty pulled the car over approximately one block away as it turned into another parking lot. Detective Petty believed there might be weapons in the car based on the victim’s…