1DCA Division 2 Oral Argument - 2026/1/20 - Jan 20, 2026

argument

1DCA Division 2 Oral Argument - 2026/1/20

California First District Court of Appeal 1h 22m 8 chapters transcribed 7 days ago official recording ↗

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What cases are on the calendar for the January 20 2026 oral argument?

Justice Richmond 0:11

Morning, everyone. Please be seated.

Justice Richmond 0:29

Thank you, Lucy. We have four cases on today's calendar. The first case, apparently, the petitioner or the appellant is a little late, so counsel anyway. So we'll hear to that one second. But I'm going to call the other three cases. And assuming whenever the counsel for the first matter arrives, we'll slot that one in. So the first one, to the extent anyone is here, is DH versus Superior Court. Ms. Lowe, are you present remotely?

Unknown 1:17

Yes, I am, Your Honor. I am

Justice Richmond 1:19

ready. Just wanted to make sure I only

Unknown 1:21

had one

Justice Richmond 1:22

missing person.

Unknown 1:23

All

Justice Richmond 1:23

right, second case, NRA or People VRA? Thank you. Third case is Gomez versus Charlie Gomez. Actually, I think it's only one person appearing, but Elizabeth Gomez. She's here? Oh, she's running ladies as well. Okay, well. And it's not even raining. Okay, the last case is Erin Kranzby, San Francisco Zen Center.

Eileen Ridley 2:08

Good morning, Robert.

Justice Richmond 2:14

Great. Now just by way of complicating matters further with these delayed appearances, there are sort of panel changes all the way along here. So what I think I will do rather than try to get you to understand them in advance is simply tell you who the panel is going to be. We have all four of the justices from this court present and we'll just sit tight and the three who are on it, you will know who they are because I will tell you. So how about RA versus, the people versus RA?

Justice Richmond 3:04

Oh, and the panel on this is Justice Richmond, myself, and Justice Miller. You may proceed.

Unknown 3:16

Okay. May I please the court? I would like to focus on the Lara Vela issue discussed in the brief. I'm asking this court to declare that application of the Lara Vela remedy in retroactive transfer hearings error. The hypothetical determination employed by the court here, whether the juvenile court would have transferred the case to adult court, is simply contrary to current transfer law after Assembly Bill 2361, which requires all of the five criteria, all of them, be evaluated through the lens of amenability. The Attorney General takes no position on the merits of this analysis. declaring only that the court did not commit the analytical error we discussed. However, the record demonstrates it did, as to the sophistication criterion under Section 707 .

Unknown 4:25

First, the court recited the Vela hypothetical formulation in its written opinion up front. as to how a retroactive transfer hearing must be conducted. Second, the court's analysis of degree of criminal sophistication of the minor under A3A omits any mention of amenability to rehabilitation. Third, the court's factual analysis in assessing the A3A factor was in fact limited to facts occurring before or at the time of the offense. It then concluded at, quote, at age... I'm

Justice Richmond 5:08

struggling, counsel, a little bit with your discussion about... I'm struggling with whether you're arguing that the court shouldn't look backwards in terms of what it would have done because somehow the amenability requires something different than that, the ultimate determination. Can you clarify that?

Unknown 5:32

Yes, absolutely. It is backward and forward. It's both. It has to be both. But the ultimate determination is whether the young person is amenable to rehabilitation. That is the focus.

Justice Richmond 5:48

Yes, but didn't the trial court in each instance look at the particular factor and then decide whether it met, I mean, it said either it favored transfer or it didn't favor transfer. And in this case, it's sort of unusual because it's favoring transfer to the criminal court, I think, when it said it favored, in favor of transfer and not to transfer to criminal court, although it's really the reverse. But in any event, in making reference to whether it was sort of a plus or a minus, if you will, weighed in favor, weighed against, why would we not assume the court knew that the underlying ultimate decision is about amenability which it does mention at various points including at the end at least

Unknown 6:42

the ultimate decision is amenability but for each factor Each factor has to be viewed through the lens of amenability. And that's the problem with the Larvier analysis.