Filed 6/18/21 P. v. Morales CA4/2 NOT TO BE PUBLISHED IN OFFICIAL REPORTS California Rules of Court, rule 8.1115(a), prohibits courts and parties from citing or relying on opinions not certified for publication or ordered published, except as specified by rule 8.1115(b). This opinion has not been certified for publication or ordered published for purposes of rule 8.1115. IN THE COURT OF APPEAL OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA FOURTH APPELLATE DISTRICT DIVISION TWO THE PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Respondent, E072462 v. (Super.Ct.No. RIF1701355) ROGELIO VERGARA MORALES et al., OPINION Defendants and Appellants. APPEAL from the Superior Court of Riverside County. Samuel Diaz, Jr., Judge. Affirmed in part; reversed in part and remanded for resentencing. Jason L. Jones, under appointment by the Court of Appeal, for Defendant and Appellant, Rogelio Vergara Morales. William G. Holzer, under appointment by the Court of Appeal, for Defendant and Appellant Mireya Arias. Rob Bonta and Xavier Becerra, Attorneys General, Lance E. Winters, Chief Assistant Attorney General, Julie L. Garland, Assistant Attorney General, Michael Pulos and Seth M. Friedman, Deputy Attorneys General, for Plaintiff and Respondent. 1 Defendants and appellants Rogelio Vergara Morales, an attorney, and Mireya Arias, his wife (collectively, defendants), concocted a plan to file gender discrimination lawsuits against minority owned hair salons and dry cleaners. Defendants went together to the hair salons and each received haircuts, they would pay for them and, if Arias paid more for her haircut, Morales would file a lawsuit against the business under Civil Code section 51.6, the Gender Tax Repeal Act of 1995 (Gender Act). They employed the same practice against dry cleaners, each dropping off a shirt, and if Arias was charged more than Morales for the cleaning, Morales would file a gender discrimination lawsuit pursuant to the Gender Act against the dry cleaning business. Morales contacted some of the businesses after filing suit and offered a settlement. Morales stalked an attorney who helped some of the victims defend against the lawsuits and who organized a demonstration against these gender discrimination lawsuits at Morales’s law office; he also disobeyed a restraining order she had obtained. Arias filed a restraining order against the attorney and several other persons who were present at the protest. The restraining order was denied and the parties were awarded attorney fees. Morales sent a email to the attorney for the parties who defended the restraining order advising he would file a federal lawsuit if they pursued collection of the attorney fees. Morales was convicted of 62 counts including extortion based on the filing of “unlawful” lawsuits and also for sending a threatening email, attempted extortion for trying to reach a settlement on these “unlawful” lawsuits, burglary, attempted theft, stalking, disobeying a restraining order, and the special allegation that filing these gender 2 discrimination lawsuits were hate crimes. Arias was convicted of 40 counts of extortion, burglary and attempted theft, along with the hate crime enhancements. Defendant Morales claims on appeal that (1) insufficient evidence was presented to support his convictions of extortion for …
Original document
Source: All recent Immigration Decisions In All the U.S. Courts of Appeals