People v. Higgins CA4/1

STATEMENT OF FACTS

Appellant’s opening brief contains an accurate summary of the facts produced at trial. We will incorporate that summary here for convenience. A. The Relationship Between Higgins and H. Watson Higgins and Watson dated for four years from 2012 to 2016, when their relationship ended on Watson’s birthday, in July, 2016. It ended because Higgins was angry and upset that Watson had gone out with a girlfriend on her birthday. He had a history in the relationship with being always angry. On that particular day, after she returned from her night out, they got into an argument, and he held her hostage with a loaded gun for two and one-half hours and threatened to kill her and her daughter. Higgins had been keeping

2 a gun at her house because she had a rabbit problem destroying her grass. After she called the police the next day, Higgins was charged and pleaded guilty to making criminal threats, and the court also imposed a five-year protective order against him. He was not convicted of assaulting her with a firearm. B. The Incident at Costco On March 23, 2018, with the protective order still in effect, Watson went to Costco in Carlsbad to buy a few things before…