Brunton

*687 *1099 Based on a single act of choking his cellmate with a tightly rolled towel, a jury found defendant Richard Brunton guilty of assault with a deadly weapon ( Pen. Code, 1 § 245, subd. (a)(1) ; hereafter, § 245(a)(1) ) and assault by means of force likely to produce great bodily injury (force-likely assault) ( § 245, subd. (a)(4) ; hereafter, § 245(a)(4) ), and found true the allegation that he personally used a deadly weapon (the towel) in the commission of the force-likely assault (§ 12022, subd. (b)(1) ). 2 The trial court sentenced Brunton to six years in prison, consisting of four years on the force-likely assault conviction, one year for the deadly weapon enhancement attached to that conviction, and one year for a prison prior. The court imposed, but stayed under section 654, a four-year sentence on the assault-with-a-deadly-weapon conviction.

On appeal, Brunton contends we must vacate his force-likely assault conviction because it is merely a different statement of the same offense for which he was also convicted (assault with a deadly weapon). (See § 954;

*1100 People v. Vidana (2016) 1 Cal.5th 632 , 650, 206 Cal.Rptr.3d 556 , 377 P.3d 805 ( Vidana ) [" 'section…