People v. Martinez CA3

DISCUSSION

I Defendant contends the trial court erred by not reducing his fines and fees to a level appropriate to a misdemeanor. The Attorney General agrees, and so do we. We shall remand the matter with directions that the court recalculate the fines and fees accordingly. Under Proposition 47, approved by the California voters in November 2014, there is a resentencing provision which allows a person serving a prison term for one or more statutorily specified crimes to petition the court for a recall of sentence and a reduction of certain felony convictions to misdemeanors, provided such reduction would not “result in an unreasonable risk of danger to public safety.” (§ 1170.18, subd. (b)(3).) Violation of Health and Safety Code section 11377 is specified in Penal Code section 1170.18, subdivision (a). The reduction of defendant’s sentence to a misdemeanor was therefore required, unless the court found that such reduction would unreasonably endanger the public safety--a finding not made here.

3 Under section 17, subdivision (b)(3), which provides that a trial court may exercise its discretion to sentence a wobbler as a misdemeanor, the crime, once sentenced as a misdemeanor,…