People v. Benton

In People v. Benton (1979) 100 Cal.App.3d 92 which was decided in 1979, the Court of Appeal held that the defendant's aggregate four-year state prison sentence was "unauthorized by law" because the defendant had admitted five charged prior felony convictions and the trial court was required to impose an additional consecutive one-year prison term for each prior conviction pursuant to section 667.5, subdivision (b) (hereafter section 667.5(b)), but the trial court erroneously "(1) failed to pronounce judgment on all five priors and (2) stayed all but two years of the defendant's prison term, without justification." (Benton, at pp. 100-101.) Concluding that "the record did not support defendant's contention that it was the trial court's intent to mitigate the additional punishment" (id. at p. 102), the Benton court remanded the cause to the trial court with directions to either "strike the additional punishment upon finding circumstances in mitigation and stating on the record its reasons therefor or impose sentence on the priors in the manner provided by law." (Id. at p. 103.)