P.

Defendant Cole Allen Wilkins was convicted of first degree murder under a felony-murder theory that the victim was killed during the commission of a burglary. The evidence at trial established that defendant burglarized a house under construction and loaded some large household appliances onto the back of a pickup truck. Sometime later, as he was driving on a freeway, an unsecured stove stolen in the burglary fell off his truck. Another driver swerved to avoid the stove, crashed into a large truck, and was killed. The trial court instructed the jury that in order for the felony-murder rule to apply, the burglary and the act causing the death must be part of one “continuous transaction.” (See CALCRIM No. 549.) It refused defendant’s request that the jury be instructed that, for purposes of felony murder, the felony continues only until the perpetrator has reached a place of temporary safety. (See CALCRIM No. 3261.) The Court of Appeal found no error in the trial court’s refusal to instruct the jury on the so-called “escape rule” and affirmed.

We conclude that it was error to refuse the instruction on the escape rule and that the error requires reversal of defendant’s…