Noting that “when longstanding noncitizen residents of this country are accused of committing a crime, the most devastating consequence may not be a prison sentence, but their removal and exclusion from the United States,” the Supreme Court in People v. Vivar today orders vacated a conviction that led to the defendant’s deportation in 2003, 40 years after he was brought to the U.S. as a six-year-old.  The opinion by Justice Mariano-Florentino Cuéllar holds prejudicial error caused the defendant, who the court says had “robust ties to the United States,” to misunderstand the immigration consequences before he opted to plead guilty to a crime that required deportation instead of to a crime that the court describes as “deportation-neutral.”

All seven justices agree that the conviction should be vacated, but Justice Carol Corrigan — joined by Chief Justice Tani Cantil-Sakauye — dissents regarding the appropriate standard for reviewing a trial court’s determination whether the error that caused the defendant’s misunderstanding was prejudicial.

The majority concludes the 2016 statute under which the defendant moved to vacate his conviction requires independent appellate review, which means deference will be given to findings based on a “trial court’s own observations,” but not when “the facts derive entirely from written declarations and other documents.”

The dissenters say that “appellate courts should apply a conventional substantial evidence standard when reviewing a trial court’s factual findings that bear upon the prejudice analysis.”  According to them, the independent review the majority adopts is appropriate in habeas corpus proceedings, where the appellate courts exercise original jurisdiction, but not when those courts exercise appellate jurisdiction in reviewing a trial court’s decision on a statutory motion.

The court’s opinion reports that the Attorney General changed his position in the Supreme Court,”now conced[ing] that the Court of Appeal erred in applying a deferential standard of review to the trial court’s prejudice findings.”

The court reverses the Fourth District, Division Two, Court of Appeal.  Also, it disapproves two other opinions from that same appellate court (one of which is a grant-and-hold for today’s opinion) and a 2020 opinion by the Fourth District, Division Three.