In Re Gray

This matter has taken a circuitous route back to this court because of defendant David Earl Gray’s failure to follow the Sacramento County Superior Court’s directions regarding the filing of a notice of appeal from a judgment against him in a criminal case, and the trial judge’s insistence that defendant could not file his notice of appeal with the trial judge’s courtroom clerk instead of with the “Appeals Unit” of the court clerk’s office as directed by the court’s Web site.

The matter was previously before us when, after the jury had returned a verdict finding him guilty, but before the trial court imposed judgment, defendant filed two separate notices of appeal. We dismissed them as purported appeals from a nonappealable order. When we did so, a judgment against defendant had still not been imposed. Our remittitur issued in September 2007.

The matter is now before us again because the California Supreme Court, via defendant’s petition for writ of habeas corpus, ordered the Director of the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation to show cause before us why (1) our remittitur should not be recalled, (2) why the trial court did not err by refusing to accept the…