Nguyen

Ha Van Nguyen was convicted by jury of robbery in one incident and attempted murder, robbery, and assault with a deadly weapon *185 in a second. 1 An armed-with-a-firearm allegation relating to the first robbery was found to be true, and both armed and use enhancements were sustained with respect to the second robbery and the attempted murder. In a bifurcated hearing conducted after the jury returned its verdicts, the trial court found Nguyen committed all the crimes while on bail for yet another robbery. Nguyen argues evidentiary, instructional, and sentencing errors require reversal. The sentencing issues he raises relating to multiple firearm and multiple crime-bail-crime enhancements do have merit, but the remaining contentions do not.

I

On September 14, 1984, Nguyen and two accomplices, one of whom was armed with a gun, robbed a store clerk in Orange County. The trio took cash from the register and employees’ purses.

Nguyen committed a robbery in Los Angeles County two months later. He was apprehended for this offense, but released on bail pending trial.

On March 2, 1985, Nguyen and an accomplice, both armed, entered a Santa Ana market. The confederate escorted…

We concur in the majority opinion but write separately to clarify a possible ambiguity regarding the proper scope of Penal Code section 654. Our holding is narrow: A robber may not avoid multiple punishment when harming an unresisting victim or witness in an act extraneous to the objective of robbery. But reliance on People v. Foster (1988) 201 Cal.App.3d 20 [ 246 Cal.Rptr. 855 ] suggests a temporal view of section 654, i.e., acts committed before the taking of the property are insulated from separate punishment while anything done after that moment is not. In reality, gratuitous violence often occurs before the robber takes the loot; and certain later acts, such as those which facilitate escape from the scene, may sometimes be inextricable from the robbery.

Here, the attempted murder of the store clerk was too extreme to serve the purpose of escape. And, elimination of a witness is not an objective related to robbery.

A petition for a rehearing was denied September 27, 1988, and the opinion was modified to read as printed above. Appellant’s petition for review by the Supreme Court was denied November 23, 1988. Mosk, J., was of the opinion that the petition should be granted.

Ha Van Nguyen was convicted by jury of robbery in one incident and attempted murder, robbery, and assault with a deadly weapon in a second. [1] An armed-with-a-firearm allegation relating to the first robbery was found to be true, and both armed and use enhancements were sustained with respect to the second robbery and the attempted murder. In a bifurcated hearing conducted after the jury returned its verdicts, the trial court found Nguyen committed all the crimes while on bail for yet another robbery. Nguyen argues evidentiary, instructional, and sentencing errors require reversal. The sentencing issues he raises relating to multiple firearm and multiple crime-bail-crime enhancements do have merit, but the remaining contentions do not.

On September 14, 1984, Nguyen and two accomplices, one of whom was armed with a gun, robbed a store clerk in Orange County. The trio took cash from the register and employees' purses.

Nguyen committed a robbery in Los Angeles County two months later. He was apprehended for this offense, but released on bail pending trial.

On March 2, 1985, Nguyen and an accomplice, both armed, entered a Santa Ana market. The confederate…