Read People v. Hayes, C057345

Conviction for possessing/carrying a "sharp instrument" upon his person while confined in a penal institution is reversed for prejudicial instructional error where a jury instruction regarding the definition of a term was not harmless beyond a reasonable doubt and created an ambiguity which the trial court expressly allowed to be exploited by the prosecutor to argue a legally incorrect theory.

Appellate Information

• Decided 02/25/2009
• Published 02/25/2009

Judges

• SIMS, Acting P.J.

Court

• California Court of Appeal

Counsel

• For Appellees:
  
• John Ward, under appointment by the Court of Appeal, for Defendant and Appellant., Edmund G. Brown Jr., Attorney General, Dane R. Gillette and Michael P. Farrell, Assistant Attorneys General and Jeffrey D. Firestone, Deputy Attorney General, for Plaintiff and Respondent.