Roger J. Traynor

The case involved a habeas corpus petition challenging a conviction under Penal Code section 415 for disturbing the peace, based on an incident where the petitioner, an attorney and pilot, dumped a bucket of gravel on an airport board president's desk during a public meeting to protest runway conditions. The court granted the writ after finding that the statute is not unconstitutionally vague or overbroad. It construed the law to apply only to willful and malicious conduct that is violent, endangers public safety or order, or creates a clear and present danger of violence, thereby avoiding conflicts with First Amendment protections. The decision addressed trial evidence and the burden of proof in habeas proceedings to determine that the conviction could not stand under the narrowed interpretation.

criminal lawfree speech

This case involved a dispute between neighboring landowners over a road on plaintiff Taormino's property that defendant Denny and his predecessors had used. Plaintiff sued to quiet title and enjoin defendant's use, claiming no easement existed by prescription or implied dedication to the public. After an initial judgment for plaintiff, the trial court reopened proceedings on defendant's motion for new trial, took additional evidence, and modified the judgment to award defendant a prescriptive easement limited to farming-related use of the road while requiring shared maintenance costs. On appeal, the California Supreme Court affirmed, holding that the trial court had jurisdiction under Code of Civil Procedure sections 660 and 662 to modify the judgment and that evidence supported a finding of adverse use sufficient for a prescriptive easement.

propertyprocedure

Plaintiff Blackmon sued defendants Hale, Lee, and two banks to recover $23,500 he had entrusted to attorney Adams for a potential purchase of a Nevada note and mortgage, after Adams misappropriated the funds from a trust account. The trial court entered judgment for all defendants except Adams (who defaulted). The court affirmed the banks' judgment because the check was deposited in the intended trust account and properly endorsed to reach its destination without injury to the plaintiff. It reversed the judgment for Hale and Lee, ruling that as co-trustees of the ongoing Adams, Hale, and Lee Trust Account they remained liable to account for the funds even after partnership dissolution and Lee's withdrawal, and had not shown they were free of responsibility for the unaccounted balance.

business & regulatoryprocedure

The case involved a dispute over the membership and control of Basic Economic Education, Inc., a California nonprofit corporation, between two former directors who claimed membership as incorporators and the current board of directors. The plaintiffs sought declaratory relief to establish their membership and invalidate certain board actions, while the defendants cross-complained to affirm the board's authority. The California Supreme Court affirmed the trial court's judgment in favor of the defendants, holding that under Corporations Code section 9603, the directors constituted the members of the corporation since neither the articles nor bylaws provided for members. The court reasoned that section 9603 specifically governs nonprofit corporations without designated members, making the directors the members for statutory purposes, and rejected arguments that section 104 on incorporators as members should override it.

business & regulatory

The case concerned a post-divorce motion to modify an interlocutory decree that required the husband to indemnify the wife for all pre-1964 tax liabilities. After the decree, the husband received a federal tax assessment of about $22,000 on income earned by a New Zealand corporation in the wife's name during the marriage; he sought relief on grounds of extrinsic fraud or mutual mistake. The trial court struck the tax provision from the decree, finding the parties had not intended the husband to bear U.S. taxes on that foreign income. The California Supreme Court reversed, ruling that the mistake was intrinsic rather than extrinsic, that the parties had a full opportunity to investigate the tax consequences of known assets, and that the strong policy favoring finality of judgments barred modification.

family lawproceduretaxesproperty

The case involved a defendant charged with assault with a deadly weapon on a peace officer, battery on a peace officer, and assault with intent to murder after a struggle with responding officers during a domestic disturbance call. A jury convicted the defendant on the first and third counts, and the trial court imposed sentence only on the assault with intent to murder count. On appeal, the defendant challenged the jury instructions regarding lesser included offenses to the assault charge and the relevance of evidence of intoxication to the required mental state. The court analyzed whether assault constitutes a general or specific intent crime, concluding that it requires only general intent to commit an injury, which may be inferred from the defendant's conduct, and that intoxication evidence is thus irrelevant to negating that intent.

criminal law