In Re Lee

The People appeal a habeas corpus order discharging Chol Soo Lee (hereinafter defendant) from custody imposed pursuant to a murder conviction. (Pen. Code, § 1506.) We affirm.

I

Defendant was convicted on July 10, 1974, of first degree murder with the use of a firearm. The case was tried in Sacramento after a change of venue from San Francisco. The prosecution relied on two eyewitnesses who observed the shooting on a Chinatown street corner on June 3, 1973, and identified defendant as the assailant; also on a third witness who saw defendant fleeing the scene just after the shooting. The conviction was affirmed in an unpublished opinion by this court in April 1975 (3 Crim. 7711); there was no petition for hearing in the Supreme Court. Defendant was sentenced to life imprisonment, and prison terms were also imposed for parole violation on an earlier grand theft from the person conviction and a subsequent conviction of possession of a concealable firearm by a felon. Deuel Vocational Institute at Tracy, California, was the place of confinement.

On October 8, 1977, defendant was charged in San Joaquin County Superior Court with first degree murder in connection with a…