In People v. Garcia, the Supreme Court today limits the circumstances under which a defendant can be convicted of multiple burglaries. The court’s opinion by Justice Mariano-Florentino Cuéllar holds the defendant was guilty of only one burglary when he entered a store with the intent to commit robbery and then took the robbery victim to a back bathroom and raped her.
Stating that “not all rooms are created equal when it comes to burglary,” the court concludes, “Where a burglar enters a structure enumerated under [Penal Code] section 459 with the requisite felonious intent, and then subsequently enters a room within that structure with such intent, the burglar may be charged with multiple burglaries only if the subsequently entered room provides a separate and objectively reasonable expectation of protection from intrusion relative to the larger structure.” In a concurring opinion, Justice Leondra Kruger joined by Justice Goodwin Liu, writes “to underscore what [she] understand[s] to be the key points of the majority‘s ruling.” We believe this is the first separate opinion that Justice Kruger has authored.
The court reverses the Fourth District, Division One, Court of Appeal.