SVP & Collateral Estoppel

In order to commit a prisoner or parolee to a state mental hospital as a sexually violent predator (SVP), one of the elements that the prosecution must prove is that the defendant has been convicted of a sexually violent offense against two or more victims. In this case, trial court relied on the doctrine of collateral estoppel to bar the defendant from litigating the issue of whether he had been convicted of the requisite qualifying prior convictions on the ground that a jury had already decided the identical issue during the defendant’s previous SVP trial.

California's Sixth District Court of Appeal affirmed and held that it was not a violation of due process for the trial court to employ collateral estoppel to establish this element and take that question away form the jury. The Court of Appeal also concluded that this use of collateral estoppel did not amount to an improper form of a directed verdict.

According to the Court of Appeal, all of the requirements of collateral estoppel were met: the issue sought to be precluded from relitigation was identical to that decided in a former proceeding; the issue was actually litigated in the former proceeding; it was necessarily decided in the former proceeding; the decision in the former proceeding was final and on the merits; and the party against whom preclusion was sought - the defendant - was the same the party to the former proceeding.

While other cases have permitted reliance on collateral estoppel with respect to factual findings from earlier SVP proceedings, those cases had suggested that its use would be limited to prior factual findings that were favorable to the defendant. (See People v. Munoz (2005) 129 Cal.App.4th 421, 432; Turner v. Superior Court (2003) 105 Cal.App.4th 1046.) As collateral estoppel was used here to establish a factual finding severely unfavorable to the defendant, this ruling represents a notable endorsement of the expanded use of collateral estoppel in the SVP context. At the same time, however, the nature of the findings subject to collateral estoppel here was rather uncontroversial, as defense counsel often concedes this element during SVP extension trials.

The unanimous decision was authored by Justice Patricia Bamattre-Manoukian.

People v. Lopez, no. H029248 (Cal.Ct.App. (6th Dist.) filed 1/18/07)