Johns

A jury convicted Denton Wesley Johns of oral copulation of a person under the age of 16 (Pen. Code, § 288a, subd. (b)(2)), committing lewd and lascivious acts on a minor (Pen. Code, § 288, subd. (a)), contributing to the delinquency of a minor (Pen. Code, § 272), and possession of child pornography (Pen. Code, § 311.11, subd. (a)). In bifurcated proceedings, the jury found that he had suffered two prior strike convictions, both for committing lewd and lascivious acts on a minor. (Pen. Code, § 667, subds. (b)-(i).) He was sentenced to prison for two consecutive twenty-five-year-to-life terms and appeals, contending his right to confrontation was violated by the presence of a support person while one of his victims was testifying, the trial court erred in denying his request to inform the jury of the applicability of the three strikes law to this case, he suffered only one, not two, strike priors, the matter should be remanded in light of People v. Superior Court (Romero), and his sentence was cruel and unusual. We reject his contentions and affirm.

Facts

Johns showed the first victim, who was the son of the maintenance man of Johns’s apartment complex, pictures of nude…