Morgan

BACKGROUND

The Encounter Between Defendant and Officers California Highway Patrol Officer Matthew Goulding was driving eastbound in Sonoma County when he spotted “two men in [a] dirt field” that was part of, or on the outskirts of, a county park. The two men were “facing each other.” One (who was later identified as defendant) had a knife and the other, a rock, and they “appeared to be in a stand-off, more or less a confrontation with each other.” Goulding pulled to a stop in the middle of the eastbound lane, at a diagonal, to “get traffic to stop coming towards [him] because [he] didn’t want anybody else near [him] when this dangerous encounter was going on.” Goulding had on his “[f]ull tan uniform with [his] CHP badge and [his] name tag and gun belt and all [his] tools,” and his patrol car was a “fully marked black and white CHP patrol vehicle.” Goulding could see that defendant was holding the knife “with a closed fist . . . with the blade pointed upward.” He was in “an athletic combative stance . . . [c]learly an aggressive stance engaging with . . . the other individual.” Goulding, who was approximately eight to 10 feet away from the men, got out of his vehicle, drew his…