Hernandez v. Municipal Court

MOSK, J.

I dissent.

I joined Justice Sullivan, Chief Justice Wright and Justice Tobriner in forming the majority in People v. Jones (1973) 9 Cal.3d 546 [ 108 Cal.Rptr. 345 , 510 P.2d 705 ], I believed the opinion was correct then and I see no persuasive reason to ignore stare decisis and to overrule the rule therein established after it has been in effect and unchallenged for 16 years.

Jones declared it “undeniable that the Sixth Amendment did enlarge the total area from which the jury can be drawn over the area which obtained at common law and that the Sixth Amendment allows the Legislature to define the total size of that area by defining the size of the judicial districts. . . . Thus, while the outer limits of the ‘district’ as used in the Sixth Amendment are flexible, encompassing greater or smaller areas as the Legislature deems wise, the mandate of the Sixth Amendment remains immutable. The district, however large or small, from which the jury is drawn must include the area wherein the crime was committed.” ( 9 Cal.3d at p. 554 , fn. omitted.)

The county-wide concept of the majority would inevitably create circumstances in which a defendant would not be tried entirely by residents of the vicinage, i.e., “the district wherein the crime shall have been committed” as required by the Sixth Amendment.

It seems to me the majority create unnecessary confusion by defining “district” broadly as “county” in this case, while simultaneously defining *730 “community” as limited to “district” in Williams v. Superior Court, post, page 736 [ 263 Cal.Rptr. 503 , 781 P.2d 537 ].

As the Attorney General urges, I would define “district” in the same manner in both cases: it is the judicial district as legislatively or judicially created. Consistency would appear to be the simplest method of guiding the bench and bar.