P. v. Lelaind
A jury found defendant Hersey Lee Lelaind to be a sexually violent predator (SVP) and the court committed him for an indeterminate term to the California Department of Mental Health (Department) for appropriate treatment and confinement in a secure facility. (Welf. & Inst. Code, 6600, 6604.) Defendant, with the assistance of appointed counsel, appeals the commitment order. Defendant contends that (1) his commitment for an indeterminate term is a violation of the federal and state constitutions due process, equal protection, ex post facto, and double jeopardy provisions (U.S. Const., art. I, 9, cl. 3, 5th & 14th Amends.; Cal. Const., art. I, 7 subd. (a), 9, 15); (2) the clinical evaluators who found that he met SVP criteria and recommended that the local district attorney file a commitment petition did so under assessment standards that did not comply with California administrative law governing the adoption of state agency regulations; and (3) he should be given a new trial because the prosecutions expert witness acknowledged after trial that she was wrong about one fact she used in forming her opinion that defendant is an SVP.
We reject the contentions and affirm the commitment order. First, defendants commitment under the SVP law is constitutional. The law satisfies due process standards in requiring proof beyond a reasonable doubt of mental illness and dangerousness for commitment and in limiting commitment to the duration of those conditions. There is no equal protection violation in the disparate treatment of SVPs and others civilly committed for mental illness because they are not similarly situated groups, and the SVP law is a civil, not a criminal statute, and thus the constitutional ban on ex post facto legislation and double jeopardy is inapplicable. Second, the Departments use of assessment standards without formally adopting the standards as regulations did not prejudice defendant. Any procedural irregularity in the Departments use of a clinical screening process that found defendant to be a possible SVP was harmless given the jurys legal determination, upon substantial evidence, that defendant is an SVP. Third, the prosecution witnesss mistake about a single fact used in forming her opinion does not require a new trial because the mistake was revealed during the trial and the corrected information did not change the witnesss opinion that defendant is an SVP.
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