P. v. Hughes
Defendant appealed from a judgment following pleas of guilty and imposition of a ten year state prison term: the upper term of eight years on count one, and a two year consecutive term on count two. His counsel raised no issues and asked this court for an independent review of the record to determine whether there are any issues that would, if resolved favorably to appellant, result in reversal or modification of the judgment. (People v. Wende (1979) 25 Cal.3d 436; see Smith v. Robbins (2000) 528 U.S. 259.) Upon review of the record we found no arguable issues, although we ordered an amendment of the abstract of judgment to require AIDS testing. We subsequently granted defendants petition for rehearing to consider the impact of the decision in Blakely v. Washington (2004) 542 U.S. 296 (Blakely), upon defendants sentence. We concluded that under Blakely the upper term imposed upon defendant must be vacated, but otherwise affirmed the judgment as amended. The California Supreme Court then transferred the case back to this Court for reconsideration in light of People v. Black (2005) 35 Cal.4th 1238 (Black). In accordance with the opinion in Black Court found no error in the imposition of upper and consecutive terms under the California Determinate Sentencing Law (DSL), and therefore vacated our prior opinion and affirmed the judgment of the trial court.
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