Second-Time DUI Offender’s Prison Sentence Upheld on Appeal
Recently, Governor Jerry Brown announced that he would ask that federal oversight of California prisons end. He stated that prison conditions had dramatically improved. The rhetoric was short on specifics, but significant nonetheless because it suggested a change in California’s realignment of prison populations is soon to follow.
Under AB109, also known as the Criminal Justice Realignment Act of 2011, California began a policy to reduce its prison population to ease over-crowding. The overcrowding was deemed by the U.S. Supreme Court to constitute cruel and unusual punishment for the prisoners and thus a violation of the U.S. Constitution’s Eight Amendment ban against cruel and unusual punishment.
Since AB109 came into effect in October of 2011, judges, prosecutors and defense attorneys have struggled at times to determine where certain defendants would serve their sentences, either in prison or county jail.
The case of People v. Atanacio Lorena Guillen exemplified this issue. Guillen was arrested in August, 2011 for DUI. His blood alcohol content (BAC) was 0.21%. In December, 2011, he plead no contest to violating Vehicle Code
