1DCA Division 3 Oral Argument - 2026/04/15 - Apr 15, 2026

argument

1DCA Division 3 Oral Argument - 2026/04/15

California First District Court of Appeal 45 min 8 chapters transcribed 1 month ago official recording ↗

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What procedural issues are raised at the start of the oral argument?

Unknown 0:04

real estate California. Yeah. Good morning, welcome. Please be seated. You will see that joining me on the bench this morning are my colleagues Justice Joanna Petru and Justice Victor Rodriguez. We will have a panel change after line one. But let's get right to it. I'll call the matter of people versus Jason Thomas and People versus Jamar Ringo Jamerson. Together they are line one. May I have appearances please? And when you enter your appearances, please do step to the microphone.

Dana Lynn Pritz 0:42

Yes, good morning, Your Honor. Dana Lynn Pritz on behalf of appellant Jason Thomas. And with the court's permission, um I'd like to reserve two minutes of my time, my ten minutes for rebuttal. So eight to present, two to rebut.

Unknown 0:58

Absolutely. That's what we'll uh we'll try to help you keep keep track of the time.

Dana Lynn Pritz 1:03

Thank you, I appreciate that.

Sangita Sinha 1:07

Good morning. Sangita Sinha for appellant Jamar Jamerson. I too would like to reserve two minutes. Okay. Thank you.

Unknown 1:14

Very good. Thank you.

Christine O 1:16

Good morning, your honors, Christine O for the people and

Unknown 1:19

respondent. Good, thank you very much. Um Ms Pritz, why don't we start with you?

Dana Lynn Pritz 1:27

Very well. Thank you. May it please the court. I wanna thank the court for the tentative opinion. It's certainly insightful to have information before argument and it's helped define what I want to discuss here today. So I'm gonna get right to it. I want to talk briefly about a couple points in relation to our challenge to the aggravated kidnapping for robbery conviction. And I'd like to start with what we know and don't know about Sean's location when the offense commenced, because this is really the crux of the whole issue. So what do we know? We know the video shows he arrived and pulled into the driveway at eleven twenty three AM. He was unloading groceries from the car, presumably walking back and forth from his car to his apartment, unloading things.

Dana Lynn Pritz 2:15

At approximately eleven twenty four and forty five seconds, about one minute fifteen seconds later. Three men rush towards Sean's car and we can see on the video that JK and Jamerson are approaching the car with their arms extended as though they're pointing a weapon, while Mr. Thomas is behind them. um making some physical adjustment to something in his clothing. But at this point there's no video or witness testimony about Sean's location. There's a gap in the video coverage. But counsel so there's no

Unknown 2:50

counsel do we know that the defendants were across the street monitoring the car?

Dana Lynn Pritz 2:54

Um, we know they were there for approximately a minute and fifteen seconds. Yes. They had parked uh uh at at about the same they parked at about the same time as Sean, but down the street. And then they moved to uh a location near a red truck, I believe it was, and they observed. And they watched for about a minute fifteen before they approached.

Unknown 3:14

Could the ju could jury have reasonably inferred that the fact that they had their arms raised with guns outstretched that they were likely having monitored what was going on, aiming it at a person rather than an empty car.

Dana Lynn Pritz 3:28

Certainly, yes, but that doesn't neg that doesn't establish from that fact we can't jump to the conclusion that they forcibly move Sean inside because there is an intermediate fact we've we also have to consider. And again, without any evidence, video or witness testimony, I want to emphasize these are all just possibilities, okay? It's possible he was out there when they first pointed the gun.

Unknown 3:57

I think we call them inferences, right? Inferences that can be made from the evidence.

Dana Lynn Pritz 4:02

Well, right now we need evidence. Okay? And the evidence there is no evidence of where he was. So what I'm saying is It's possible he was in one of three places when they arrived. It's possible he was already inside, but I agree with you. It's more likely they were pointing at a person than an empty vehicle. So the other possibility, we don't have evidence of any of this. It's a possibility he was outside, he saw them approaching, and he ran inside on his own to get away from them. And then of course it's possible they actually forced him inside.