Unreported / Non-Citable
Background
Alfredo Martinez was convicted in Los Angeles County in 1991 of attempted murder and assault with a firearm on a peace officer, receiving a determinate 28-year term: nine years upper term for attempted murder, four years for a firearm enhancement, and 15 years for three prior serious felony enhancements. In 2001, while in prison in Kings County, he committed an in-prison assault and was convicted in 2002 of assault with a deadly weapon, with great bodily injury and prior conviction findings, and sentenced to 25 years to life plus enhancements, consecutive to the Los Angeles sentence.
In 2022, the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation identified Martinez under Penal Code section 1172.75 as serving a Kings County term that included a section 667.5 prior prison term enhancement. At the 2024 resentencing hearing, the trial court struck that enhancement but declined to strike prior felony convictions under Romero. Martinez appealed, claiming the court should have reconsidered the Los Angeles upper-term sentence, vacated his restitution fine under section 1465.9, and recalculated custody credits under Buckhalter.
The Court’s Holding
The court held that Martinez forfeited his upper-term sentencing claim by failing to seek any relief in the trial court relating to his Los Angeles County sentence. Applying People v. Scott and People v. Stowell, it explained that complaints about how a trial court exercises sentencing discretion cannot be raised for the first time on appeal, and that even constitutional claims may be forfeited. It found no retroactive substantive change in law or extenuating circumstance such as futility, and rejected the unauthorized sentence doctrine because Martinez's claim challenged the asserted failure to exercise discretion rather than a sentence unlawful under any circumstance.
The court accepted the People's concessions on the remaining issues. It vacated the $1,000 restitution fine imposed in 2002 under section 1202.4, citing section 1465.9, subdivision (d), and directed that the amended abstract omit both that fine and the corresponding suspended parole revocation fine under section 1202.45. It also remanded for recalculation of actual custody credits up to the date of resentencing under sections 2900.1 and 2900.5 and Buckhalter, and ordered issuance of an amended abstract. The judgment was otherwise affirmed.
The court flagged, without deciding, a question of fundamental jurisdiction over the Los Angeles County case. The record below reflected a belief that Martinez was serving an indeterminate 28-years-to-life term there, but the parties on appeal agreed, and the abstract supported, that the sentence was a determinate 28-year term. It therefore appeared Martinez had completed that sentence several years before the 2024 hearing. Because the claim was forfeited and the trial court took no action in that case, the court found it unnecessary to reach the issue or order supplemental briefing.
Key Takeaways
- A defendant who remains silent at resentencing about a trial court's failure to exercise sentencing discretion forfeits appellate review, even when the issue has constitutional dimensions.
- The unauthorized sentence exception to forfeiture is narrow and does not cover claims that a trial court failed to exercise discretion, as opposed to imposing a sentence unlawful under any circumstance.
- Under section 1465.9, subdivision (d), a restitution fine imposed under section 1202.4 becomes unenforceable and must be vacated 10 years after imposition, and the corresponding suspended parole revocation fine must also be omitted from the amended abstract.
- When a prison term already in progress is modified on resentencing, the trial court must recalculate and credit all actual time served, whether in jail or prison and whether before or after the original commitment.
- The court identified but expressly did not decide whether the trial court had fundamental jurisdiction over the Los Angeles County case, leaving that question for any future proceeding.
Why It Matters
The opinion applies established forfeiture doctrine to the section 1172.75 resentencing context, making clear that defendants must raise challenges to discretionary sentencing choices, including those affecting related cases discussed at the hearing, in the trial court or lose them on appeal. It also illustrates the limits of the unauthorized sentence doctrine where the complaint concerns the exercise of discretion rather than a sentence unlawful under any circumstance.
The court's discussion of the apparent completion of the Los Angeles determinate term, and its observation that a misunderstanding of a client's sentence could raise effectiveness questions, signals a potential issue for future proceedings without resolving it. The opinion also provides a straightforward application of the 2025 amendment to section 1465.9 requiring vacatur of older restitution fines, paired with the settled Buckhalter rule requiring full recalculation of actual custody credits on remand.