People v. Clark CA2/3

BACKGROUND

In 2017 a jury convicted defendant and appellant Albert Ahmad Clark of the 1988 first degree murder of Leroy Galloway. The trial court (Judge Stanley Blumenfeld) sentenced Clark to 32 years to life in the state prison, calculated as 25 years to life for Galloway’s murder, plus two years for the jury’s true finding on a “personal use” firearm allegation under the then-applicable version of Penal Code section 12022.5, subdivision (a),1 plus five years for a serious felony prior conviction under section 667, subdivision (a)(1). The serious felony prior was a September 1980 conviction in Los Angeles Superior Court case number A559050 for murder.2 In April 2020 we affirmed Clark’s conviction but remanded the case for the trial court to exercise its discretion to strike—or decline to strike—the serious felony prior under Senate Bill No. 1393 (Senate Bill 1393). (People v. Clark (Apr. 22, 2020, B294062) [nonpub. opn.] (Clark I).)3 Our 2020 opinion set forth the facts; we need not detail them here.4 In a nutshell, one day in February 1988

References to statutes are to the Penal Code. At trial, outside the jury’s presence, Clark admitted that prior conviction and…