People v. Hyatt

IN THE SUPREME COURT OF CALIFORNIA THE PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Appellant, v. JASON ROBERT HYATT, Defendant and Respondent. S290426 Fourth Appellate District, Division Three G063126 Orange County Superior Court 19NF3055 August 6, 2026 Justice Kruger authored the opinion of the Court, in which Chief Justice Guerrero and Justices Corrigan, Liu, Groban, Evans, and Goldman* concurred. * Associate Justice of the Court of Appeal, First Appellate District, Division Four, assigned by the Chief Justice pursuant to article VI, section 6 of the California Constitution.  PEOPLE v. HYATT S290426 Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. Penal Code section 1381 permits a defendant who “has been sentenced to and has entered upon a term of imprisonment in a state prison” to demand that the district attorney promptly bring any other pending criminal charges to trial. If the district attorney fails to try the defendant’s outstanding charges within 90 days, the charges must be dismissed. In this case, the trial court, sitting as a magistrate, dismissed a felony complaint based on a district attorney’s failure to comply with a Penal Code section 1381 demand. The defendant made the demand after he was sentenced to a state prison term on unrelated charges but before he had been delivered to prison custody. The District Attorney appealed, arguing that the section 1381 demand was premature. Disagreeing, the Court of Appeal affirmed the dismissal of the felony complaint. As the case comes to us, it presents two questions. The first question is whether the Court of Appeal should have entertained the District Attorney’s appeal in the first place. The answer turns on whether the magistrate’s dismissal order qualified as a dismissal in a “felony case” appealable by statute in the Court of Appeal (Pen. Code, §§ 1235, 1238, subd. (b)(8)), even though the dismissed felony allegations had been made only by complaint and not by indictment or information. The second question concerns the merits of the Court of Appeal’s 1  PEOPLE v. HYATT Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. decision. The answer to that question turns on the meaning of the statutory phrase “has been sentenced to and has entered upon a term of imprisonment in a state prison.” (Id., § 1381.) Does the phrase mean that the demand may be made as soon as the court has pronounced a sentence including a term in state prison? Or must the defendant have been both sentenced and delivered to prison custody? As to the first question, we conclude, in common with the Court of Appeal in this case, that a magistrate’s order dismissing a felony complaint is a dismissal order in a “felony case” that may be appealed to the Court of Appeal. As to the second question, we conclude, contrary to the Court of Appeal in this case, that a defendant has not “entered upon a term of imprisonment in a state prison” for purposes of Penal Code section 1381 until the defendant’s “actual delivery . . .into the custody of the Director of Corrections.” (Pen. Code, § 2900, subd. (a).) Before the defendant has been delivered into prison custody, a Penal Code section 1381 demand is premature. I. In November 2019, the Orange County District Attorney filed a felony complaint accusing defendant Jason Robert Hyatt of assault by means of force likely to produce great bodily injury (Pen. Code, § 245, subd. (a)(4)), with two serious felony priors. A magistrate oversaw Hyatt’s arraignment, at which Hyatt entered a plea of not guilty. But the magistrate never conducted a preliminary examination on the complaint, due in part to repeated continuances caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as Hyatt’s later failure to appear. The Orange County complaint was still outstanding when, on August 12, 2022, Hyatt was sentenced to a six-year prison 2  PEOPLE v. HYATT Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. sentence on unrelated charges in Riverside County. The same day, Hyatt’s counsel in the Riverside matter personally served the Orange County District Attorney with a demand under Penal Code section 1381 (section 1381). The demand, signed by Hyatt’s counsel, informed the District Attorney that Hyatt was “currently committed to a term of imprisonment in the California Department of Corrections,” and that as of August 12, 2022, he was “in the custody of the Riverside County Sheriff’s Department, pending transportation to the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation[.]” The letter provided Hyatt’s full name, the name and address of the county facility holding him, and the name, address, and phone number of his counsel. The letter demanded that the Orange County charge be brought to trial within 90 days. The District Attorney’s office stamped the demand letter as “received” on August 17, 2022. On August 25, 2022, a deputy district attorney sent a response to Hyatt at the Riverside County Jail, without copying or otherwise notifying Hyatt’s counsel, who had prepared and signed the demand letter.1 The response stated that because 1 This was evidently an error. As the District Attorney acknowledges, an attorney should not directly communicate with a party known to be represented by counsel; the deputy district attorney should have directed his communications to counsel and not to Hyatt himself. Had this error not occurred, this case might well not be here. As the Court of Appeal majority observed, “had the District Attorney simply complied with its obligation to communicate with Hyatt’s attorney, rather than sending its response letter to Hyatt at the county jail, Hyatt’s attorney could have obviated this dispute by promptly sending (or advising Hyatt to send) another section 1381 3  PEOPLE v. HYATT Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. Hyatt sent his demand letter “while still in county jail, the demand is invalid . . . and does not invoke the running of the 90- day time limit” set by section 1381. As a result, the District Attorney had decided to “take no further action at this time.” As the Court of Appeal observed, and the District Attorney apparently concedes, there is no evidence in the record that Hyatt received this response. The District Attorney filed the response letter in the docket of the Orange County Superior Court on September 2, 2022. Five days later, Hyatt was admitted into Wasco State Prison. Ten months later, while still at Wasco State Prison, Hyatt sent a second Notice and Demand for Trial on a form provided by the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR), again seeking trial of his pending charges within 90 days. After receiving this second letter, the District Attorney initiated a CDCR transport to bring Hyatt to Orange County for a preliminary hearing. But before the magistrate conducted a preliminary examination on the felony complaint, Hyatt filed a motion to dismiss pursuant to section 1381, based on the original demand sent in August 2022. The magistrate agreed that Hyatt’s first letter satisfied the statutory requirements, found that the People had failed to bring him to trial within 90 days, and dismissed the complaint. The District Attorney appealed the dismissal to the Court of Appeal. The notice of demand once Hyatt arrived in prison.” (People v. Hyatt (2025) 109 Cal.App.5th 735, 744–745 & fn. 7.) While the omission has no bearing on the legal issues presented in this appeal, the case nonetheless illustrates why lawyers must comply with their duty to properly communicate with represented defendants through counsel. 4  PEOPLE v. HYATT Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. appeal cited Penal Code section 1238, subdivision (a)(8) (section 1238(a)(8)), which authorizes the People to appeal “an order or judgment dismissing or otherwise terminating all or any portion of the action” in a felony case. (§ 1238(a)(8); see also Pen. Code, § 1235 (section 1235).) The Court of Appeal affirmed the trial court’s dismissal of the felony complaint under section 1381. (People v. Hyatt, supra, 109 Cal.App.5th 735 (Hyatt).) As an initial matter, in an unpublished portion of the opinion, a unanimous court rejected Hyatt’s contention that the court lacked jurisdiction because the case was not a “felony case” appealable to the Court of Appeal under sections 1235 and 1238(a)(8). The court reasoned that the People’s filing of a felony complaint initiated a “felony case” even though the magistrate dismissed the complaint, and no information or indictment was ever filed in the superior court. (Hyatt [unpublished portion].) In so holding, the court relied on People v. Rodriguez (2013) 217 Cal.App.4th 326, which had similarly concluded that the Court of Appeal may adjudicate the People’s appeal of a magistrate’s order dismissing felony counts. The court distinguished People v. Nickerson (2005) 128 Cal.App.4th 33 (Nickerson), which had held a magistrate’s order reducing a felony charge to a misdemeanor should have been directed to the appellate division of the superior court, which has jurisdiction over appeals in “misdemeanor cases” (Pen. Code, § 1466), rather than the Court of Appeal. The court in this case agreed with the result in Nickerson, but disagreed with a portion of the opinion reasoning that a felony case commences only after an information or indictment is filed in the superior court or a felony complaint is certified to the superior court following a plea of guilty or nolo contendere. (See Nickerson, at p. 38; Hyatt, at p. 741.) 5  PEOPLE v. HYATT Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. On the merits, a divided court concluded in a published opinion that Hyatt’s section 1381 demand was effective to start the 90-day clock, notwithstanding the fact that Hyatt had not yet been delivered to the custody of the state prison. (Hyatt, supra, 109 Cal.App.5th at pp. 741–748.) The majority reasoned that statutory language requiring the defendant to have “ ‘entered upon a term of imprisonment in a state prison’ ” was not intended to describe a physical location, but rather “a type of defendant who can invoke its provisions, i.e., those defendants who are serving a state prison sentence.” (Id. at p. 744, quoting § 1381.) The court further reasoned that “[t]he fact that Hyatt was temporarily incarcerated in county jail while awaiting transfer to a state prison facility did not mean he had not begun serving his state prison sentence or make his demand for a speedy trial ineffective.” (Hyatt, at p. 742.) The Court of Appeal acknowledged that other courts had reached a different conclusion, but declined to follow them. (Id. at p. 747, discussing People v. Gutierrez (1994) 30 Cal.App.4th 105, 110–111 (Gutierrez), and People v. Clark (1985) 172 Cal.App.3d 975, 980– 981 (Clark).) Justice Motoike dissented. She criticized the majority for adopting a “novel interpretation of section 1381 that is not only unsupported by the statute’s plain language or any legislative history, but constitutes an unwarranted departure from decades-old, settled case law that has been followed by courts and criminal law practitioners for the past 40 years.” (Hyatt, supra, 109 Cal.App.5th at p. 749 (dis. opn. of Motoike, J.).) The District Attorney sought our review on the grounds that the Court of Appeal erroneously interpreted section 1381, creating a conflict with Clark and Gutierrez. In his answer to the People’s petition, Hyatt renewed his challenge to the Court 6  PEOPLE v. HYATT Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. of Appeal’s appellate jurisdiction. We granted review to address both issues, each of which has given rise to disagreement among the Courts of Appeal. Both present questions of statutory interpretation; our review of those questions is de novo. (People v. Walker (2024) 16 Cal.5th 1024, 1032 (Walker).) II. We begin with the jurisdictional question. In criminal cases, the prosecution “ ‘has no right to appeal except as provided by statute.’ ” (People v. Superior Court (Mitchell) (2024) 17 Cal.5th 228, 244, quoting People v. Williams (2005) 35 Cal.4th 817, 822–823.) “The circumstances allowing a People’s appeal are enumerated in section 1238.” (People v. Chacon (2007) 40 Cal.4th 558, 564.) The District Attorney’s notice of appeal cited section 1238(a)(8), which permits the prosecution to appeal an “order or judgment dismissing or otherwise terminating all or any portion of the action[.]”2 (§ 1238, subd. (a)(8).) The authorizations in section 1238 are bounded by section 1235, subdivision (a), which empowers “[e]ither party to a felony case” to appeal certain questions of law, specifying that “[t]he provisions of this title” — including section 1238 — “apply only to such appeals.” (§ 1235, subd. (a).) Subdivision (b) of section 1235 states that an appeal in a felony 2 In his briefing here, the District Attorney also invokes Penal Code section 1238, subdivision (a)(1), which allows the People to appeal “[a]n order setting aside all or any portion of the indictment, information, or complaint.” The District Attorney did not cite subdivision (a)(1) in his original notice of appeal, nor did he mention subdivision (a)(1) in his briefing in the Court of Appeal. We do not address whether subdivision (a)(1) provides an additional basis for appealing a magistrate’s dismissal of a felony complaint on section 1381 grounds. 7  PEOPLE v. HYATT Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. case “is to the court of appeal” for the district. Thus sections 1235 and 1238 provide for Court of Appeal jurisdiction over appeals only in “felony case[s].” (A separate provision, Penal Code section 1466, governs appeals in infraction and misdemeanor cases, which must instead be taken to the appellate divisions of the superior courts.) Penal Code section 691 then provides that, “unless it is otherwise apparent from context,” the term “felony case,” as used in the relevant part of the Penal Code, means “a criminal action in which a felony is charged[.]” (§ 691, subd. (f).) The primary dispute between the parties is whether this case counts as a “felony case” — that is, an action in which a felony is “charged.” The District Attorney says it does; Hyatt says it does not, and therefore no appeal lies under sections 1235 and 1238. This also, of course, is not an infraction or misdemeanor case, so no appeal would lie under Penal Code section 1466 either. Hyatt contends that what the District Attorney should have done, rather than attempt to appeal the dismissal of the complaint, was file a motion in superior court to reinstate the complaint. (See Pen. Code, § 871.5.) In interpreting statutes, we begin by examining the words used, giving them their ordinary, commonsense meaning. (See, e.g., Walker, supra, 16 Cal.5th at p. 1032.) Here, the District Attorney seeks review of the dismissal of a criminal complaint against Hyatt alleging that he committed felony offenses. In ordinary legal usage, felony offenses charged by complaint are commonly referred to as “felony charges,” and the resulting action as a “felony case.” (E.g., People v. Cota (2025) 112 Cal.App.5th 1118, 1124 [“a felony complaint charged”]; Egelston v. State Personnel Bd. (2025) 112 Cal.App.5th 1050, 1053 [the District Attorney “subsequently charged appellant in 8  PEOPLE v. HYATT Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. a felony complaint”]; Teran v. Superior Court (2025) 112 Cal.App.5th 371, 375 [“A felony complaint . . . charged petitioner”]; see also, e.g., People v. Henson (2022) 13 Cal.5th 574, 584 (Henson) [“Prior to unification, the complaint in a felony case was filed at the municipal court”].) Common usage thus suggests that this is, in fact, a “felony case” (§ 1235) in which felonies have been “charged” (§ 691), meaning the prosecution is entitled to appeal the dismissal of those charges to the Court of Appeal. Ultimately, we conclude that this straightforward answer is in fact the correct answer. But the question is more complicated than it may at first appear, owing to the nuances of California charging procedure and the complex history that gave rise to the present statutory regime. A. Hyatt’s central argument is that he was never formally “charged” with a felony because the district attorney filed only a complaint and not an indictment or information. To understand the argument, we review some familiar background. Under California law, a criminal complaint is, as a formal matter, filed with the magistrate, not the superior court — unlike either an indictment (which is presented to the superior court by a grand jury) or an information, which can be filed in the superior court only after the magistrate conducts a preliminary examination on the felony complaint. (See §§ 738, 806, 889, 917 [collectively establishing this framework].) The “magistrate’s primary role relates to a defendant’s arrest and detention pending a court trial”; by examining the felony complaint before the filing of an information, the magistrate provides a check on the initiation of formal felony prosecution. (Henson, supra, 13 Cal.5th at p. 588; see also id. at p. 589 [discussing Hurtado v. California (1884) 110 U.S. 516].) This means that the filing of a felony complaint 9  PEOPLE v. HYATT Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. and the magistrate’s preliminary examination on the complaint, “while being in some sense the initiation of a criminal case [citations], are components of a threshold proceeding that precedes the formal trial court prosecution of the defendant and that ensures that the district attorney or other prosecutorial authority does not abuse his or her power.” (Henson, at p. 589.) It is only once the information or other accusatory pleading is filed in superior court that “formal trial court prosecution” begins. (Ibid.; see id. at p. 588.) As we have observed, this distinction between magistrate proceedings and superior court proceedings was once clearer than it tends to be in modern practice. At one time, private parties could file criminal complaints directly with the magistrate, without any involvement from a public prosecutor. (Henson, supra, 13 Cal.5th at p. 587.) But this practice changed more than 50 years ago, thanks to case law requiring that a complaint be approved by the local district attorney. (Ibid., citing People v. Municipal Court (Pellegrino) (1972) 27 Cal.App.3d 193, 205–206.) In addition, and as particularly relevant to Hyatt’s argument here, magistrate proceedings were once conducted in different courts from the courts in which felony trials were held. Before 1998, California had a two-tiered system of trial courts, consisting of superior courts, which handled felonies and high-value civil cases, and so-called inferior courts (either municipal courts or justice courts), which handled misdemeanors, infractions, and low-value civil cases. (California Criminal Procedure and Trial Court Unification: Background Study, California Law Revision Com. Report (2002) pp. 2–4.) “Prior to unification, the complaint in a felony case was filed at the municipal court,” with the municipal court judge acting in the capacity of magistrate. (Henson, at p. 584.) But in 10  PEOPLE v. HYATT Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. 1998, “the voters approved Proposition 220, permitting unification of the municipal and superior courts,” and every county opted in favor of unification. (Id. at p. 593.) Now, following unification, “the felony complaint that initiates the magistrate proceeding is filed at the [superior] court” and magistrate proceedings are now conducted by superior court judges, sitting as magistrates. (Id. at pp. 588–589, citing Koski v. James (1975) 47 Cal.App.3d 349, 354–355; see generally id. at pp. 586–590 [describing history of magistrate proceedings].) As a result of these developments, the institutionally separate role of magistrates “tends to be obscured in modern practice.” (Henson, supra, 13 Cal.5th at pp. 587–588.) But as we explained in Henson, the formal legal distinction between magistrate proceedings and superior court proceedings remains relevant for a number of purposes in the law. (Id. at pp. 589– 590, citing Serna v. Superior Court (1985) 40 Cal.3d 239, 257 (Serna); see Henson, at p. 579 [holding, in part based on this distinction, that section 954 permits a prosecutor to file a single information in the superior court combining related offenses that were the subject of separate preliminary examinations before the magistrate].) The question before us is whether the application of the appellate jurisdiction provisions in Penal Code sections 1235 and 1238 is one of these purposes. B. Based on this institutional distinction between magistrates and superior courts, Hyatt argues that the preliminary proceedings against him before the magistrate never matured into a “felony case,” as that term is used in section 1235 and defined in Penal Code section 691. Because no preliminary examination was held, and thus no information or 11  PEOPLE v. HYATT Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. other accusatory pleading was ever filed in the superior court, in its capacity as a superior court, he contends that the People never formally instituted a felony prosecution. This argument derives from the opinion in Nickerson, which articulated this view of what it means to “charge” a felony within the meaning of Penal Code section 691. In Nickerson, the court addressed what it described as a novel issue created by trial court unification. (Nickerson, supra, 128 Cal.App.4th at p. 35.) The prosecutor in that case had filed a criminal complaint alleging two misdemeanors, as well as a third “wobbler” offense charged as a felony. But after the preliminary examination, the magistrate exercised his power under Penal Code section 17, subdivision (b)(5), to reduce the felony charge to a misdemeanor. (Nickerson, at pp. 36–37.) The defendant was then tried for two misdemeanors and convicted of one. He tried to appeal that misdemeanor conviction to the Court of Appeal. (Id. at p. 36.) The Court of Appeal rejected the effort, concluding that the case was a misdemeanor case appealable only to the appellate division of the superior court under Penal Code section 1466. (Nickerson, at pp. 38–39.) In the portion of the opinion on which Hyatt relies, Nickerson reasoned that “a defendant is not ‘charged with a felony’ within the meaning of Penal Code section 691” until an accusatory pleading charging a felony is filed in superior court. (Nickerson, supra, 128 Cal.App.4th at p. 38.) Nickerson cited Penal Code section 949, which provides: “The first pleading on the part of the people in the superior court in a felony case is the indictment, information, or complaint in any case certified to the superior court under Section 859a” — i.e., a complaint to which the defendant has entered a plea of guilty or nolo contendere. (Pen. Code, § 949, see id., § 859a.) In the Nickerson court’s view, 12  PEOPLE v. HYATT Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. a felony criminal complaint filed only with a magistrate does not suffice. (Nickerson, at p. 38.) Nickerson, in turn, relied for this conclusion on the reasoning of Serna. In Serna, we were asked to consider whether a four-year delay between the filing of a misdemeanor complaint and the defendant’s arrest violated his constitutional rights to a speedy trial. (Serna, supra, 40 Cal.3d at p. 245; see Cal. Const., art. I, § 15; U.S. Const., amend. VI.) We held that a misdemeanor complaint was a “formal charge” sufficient to trigger a defendant’s right to a speedy trial. (Serna, at pp. 257, 262; see id. at pp. 251, 258.) We distinguished an earlier case, People v. Hannon (1977) 19 Cal.3d 588, 605, which had held that the right to speedy trial did not attach upon the filing of a felony complaint. We explained, among other things, that a “felony complaint, unlike a misdemeanor complaint, does not confer trial jurisdiction.” (Serna, at p. 257.) Rather, a “felony complaint functions to bring the defendant before a magistrate for an examination into whether probable cause exists to formally charge him with a felony. Only if probable cause exists may an information invoking the trial jurisdiction of the superior court be filed . . . . This step, preliminary to formal accusation in the court with jurisdiction over the prosecution of the charge, does not implicate the Sixth Amendment right to speedy trial[.]” (Ibid.) Based on Nickerson and Serna, Hyatt argues that because the felony complaint against him was dismissed by the magistrate and thus never came under the jurisdiction of the superior court, there was no “felony case” within the jurisdiction of the Court of Appeal. Neither decision persuades us to Hyatt’s point of view. 13  PEOPLE v. HYATT Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. As an initial matter, both Serna and Nickerson are readily distinguishable. Nickerson did not consider whether an appeal from a magistrate’s dismissal of a felony complaint could be taken before the Court of Appeal. Rather, the court held that when a “matter goes before the magistrate for a preliminary examination and the court as magistrate reduces all of the felony charges from felonies to misdemeanors,” an appeal of the resulting misdemeanor judgment belongs in the appellate division of the superior court rather than the Court of Appeal. (Nickerson, supra, 128 Cal.App.4th at p. 38.) As the Court of Appeal in this case observed, that is a different question that may well invoke different considerations from the issue we confront here.3 Serna, for its part, concerned matters even further afield. There we considered whether a misdemeanor complaint amounted to a “formal charge” to which speedy trial rights attach. In distinguishing felony cases, we not only noted that there is a formal distinction between the effect of a misdemeanor complaint and that of a felony complaint, but we emphasized practical differences particular to the speedy trial context. (Serna, supra, 40 Cal.3d at p. 257 [noting that “the filing of a felony complaint, unlike indictment or accusation by 3 As the Court of Appeal in this case observed, Penal Code section 17, subdivision (b)(5) (section 17 (b)(5)), provides that when a wobbler is reduced from a felony to a misdemeanor, “it is a misdemeanor for all purposes.” Hyatt disputes that this provision adequately resolves the issue before the Nickerson court, but that dispute is beyond the scope of our inquiry here; the point is only that Nickerson’s broader conclusions about the meaning of the term “felony case” were not clearly necessary to the decision in that case. 14  PEOPLE v. HYATT Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. information, does not threaten oppressive pretrial incarceration,” and comes with strict timelines that “ensure that the defendant is not subjected to extended anxiety or public opprobrium”]; accord, Henson, supra, 13 Cal.5th at p. 590.) We had no reason to opine on the statutory definition of a “felony case” for purposes of appellate jurisdiction. Although Nickerson did opine on the meaning of the term “felony case,” its opinion does not reflect the only possible reading of the plain statutory text. The Nickerson opinion assumes that when section 1235 and Penal Code section 691 use the term “felony case,” and speak in terms of whether a felony has been “charged,” that must mean there has been a “formal accusation in the court with jurisdiction over the prosecution of the charge.” (Serna, supra, 40 Cal.3d at p. 257.) This is not an implausible conclusion to draw, but it is certainly not one compelled by the statutory text. Neither section 1235 nor Penal Code section 691 specifies that felony charges must be “formal” or that they must be filed “in superior court.” And the Nickerson opinion offers no clear reason why these provisions must be read in a manner that limits appellate jurisdiction to those cases in which there has been a formal felony accusation of the sort that would, for instance, start the running of the constitutional speedy trial clock, as in Serna. Hyatt, again drawing on Nickerson, attempts to fill this gap by way of Penal Code section 949, which specifies that “[t]he first pleading on the part of the people in the superior court in a felony case is the indictment, information, or the complaint certified to the superior court [where the defendant has pleaded guilty or nolo contendere],” while the “first pleading on the part of the people in a misdemeanor or infraction case is a complaint except as otherwise provided by law.” (Pen. Code, § 949.) But 15  PEOPLE v. HYATT Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. by its terms, that provision merely confirms that these superior court filings are the first pleadings filed by the people in superior court in a felony case. Penal Code section 949 neither states nor necessarily implies that a felony complaint filed with a magistrate does not “charge” a felony (§ 691) or that such a complaint does not give rise to a “felony case” (§ 1235). And aside from Penal Code section 949, Hyatt points to nothing in the Penal Code that would shed any light on the matter. C. While Hyatt’s argument about when a “felony case” begins is not clearly supported by the statutory text, neither is it clearly foreclosed. It is therefore appropriate for us to examine the history of the language for more insight into its meaning. (E.g., McHugh v. Protective Life Ins. Co. (2021) 12 Cal.5th 213, 227.) That history supports the reading that ordinary usage would suggest: A case dismissing a felony complaint is a “felony case” over which the Courts of Appeal have jurisdiction. The “felony case” language at issue was added to section 1235, and the present definition added to Penal Code section 691, as part of a 1998 overhaul of the Penal Code to implement trial court unification. (Sen. Bill No. 2139 (1997–1998 Reg. Sess.), Stats. 1998, ch. 931; see generally Snukal v. Flightways Manufacturing, Inc. (2000) 23 Cal.4th 754, 763, fn. 2 [describing several changes made by the 1998 court unification legislation].) Before the legislation was enacted, section 1235 authorized the Courts of Appeal to hear an appeal in a “criminal action within the original trial jurisdiction of a superior court.” (Former § 1235, Stats. 1951, ch. 1674, § 132, p. 3855.) By contrast, Penal Code section 1466 provided: “An appeal may be taken from a judgment or order of an inferior court, in an infraction or 16  PEOPLE v. HYATT Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. misdemeanor case, to the superior court . . . .” (Former § 1466, Stats. 1992, ch. 78 (Sen. Bill 839), § 2.) The 1998 court unification legislation amended the appellate jurisdiction statutes to eliminate the references to inferior versus superior courts. The legislation amended section 1235 by replacing the words “criminal action within the original trial jurisdiction of a superior court” with “felony case.” (Stats. 1998, ch. 931, § 379.) It also amended Penal Code section 1466, eliminating the reference to an “inferior court,” while retaining reference to an “infraction or misdemeanor” case. (Id., § 424.) Finally, it added Penal Code section 691, subdivision (f)’s definition of a felony complaint as a “criminal action in which a felony is charged,” and defined a “misdemeanor or infraction case” in the following subdivision as “a criminal action in which a misdemeanor or infraction is charged[.]” (Stats. 1998, ch. 931, § 354.) As a result of these changes, “ ‘[t]he proper appellate procedure is no longer determined by which court (i.e., “inferior” or “superior”) issued the order. It is now determined by the “type” of case. [Citations.] If the order occurred in an “infraction or misdemeanor case,” the proper appeal is to the appellate division of the superior court. [Citation.] If the order occurred in a “felony case,” the proper appeal is to the Court of Appeal.’ ” (People v. Rodriguez (2013) 217 Cal.App.4th 326, 332; see also ibid. [concluding that an appeal from an order dismissing felony counts under section 1387 properly lies in the Court of Appeal].) Hyatt insists the legislation was not intended to give the prosecution a new appellate remedy — an appeal to the Court of Appeal — when a magistrate dismisses a felony charge. He relies on remarks from the California Law Revision Commission, which drafted and proposed the legislation, indicating that changes to the appellate jurisdiction statutes 17  PEOPLE v. HYATT Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. were intended “to preserve existing procedures for criminal cases by replacing references to superior court criminal cases with references to felony cases.”4 (Trial Court Unification: Revision of Codes (July 1998) 28 Cal. Law Revision Com. Rep. (1998) p. 73; see also id. at pp. 60, 406.) But as the District Attorney points out, the discussion also emphasizes that the legislation implemented a constitutional amendment that “allow[ed] for statutory expansion of court of appeal jurisdiction.” (Id. at p. 73.) And perhaps most tellingly, in a comment on the proposed revisions to section 1235 that were ultimately enacted into law, the Report reads: “Section 1235 is amended to accommodate unification of the municipal and superior courts in a county . . . Appeals in felony cases lie to the court of appeal, regardless of whether the appeal is from the superior court, the municipal court, or the action of a magistrate.” (Id. at pp. 455, 480, italics added.) Although Hyatt insists that this brief comment “was not intended to expand appellate procedures” to include appeals from magistrate proceedings, he fails to explain what else the Commission might 4 Proposition 220 made the constitutional changes necessary to merge the superior and municipal courts, but required implementing legislation to amend the many provisions of the code affected by trial court unification. The Legislature tasked the Law Revision Commission with recommending “statutory changes that may be necessitated by court unification.” (28 Law Rev. Com. Rpt. (1998) p. 6, quoting 1997 Cal. Stat. res. ch. 102; see also Stats. 1998, ch. 91.) The Commission prepared a lengthy report proposing dozens of amendments to the code, with explanatory comments. In the sections of the Penal Code relevant here, the Legislature enacted the Commission’s proposed amendments verbatim. 18  PEOPLE v. HYATT Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. have meant by including the “action of a magistrate” in a list of “felony” matters appealable to the Court of Appeal. In sum, the legislative history supports the conclusion that the statutory language most naturally suggests: If a superior court judge, sitting as a magistrate, dismisses a felony complaint, that dismissal may be appealed to the Court of Appeal pursuant to its statutory jurisdiction over appeals in “felony case[s].” (§ 1235; see id., § 1238.) D. Hyatt contends, finally, that the district attorney should have challenged the magistrate’s order using the procedures set forth in Penal Code section 871.5 (section 871.5), rather than appealing directly to the Court of Appeal. Section 871.5 provides that “when an action is dismissed by a magistrate” pursuant to section 1381 and some other similar sections, “the prosecutor may make a motion in the superior court within 15 days to compel the magistrate to reinstate the complaint or a portion thereof and to reinstate the custodial status of the defendant under the same terms and conditions as when the defendant last appeared before the magistrate.” (§ 871.5.) A corresponding subdivision of section 1238 expressly authorizes the people to appeal the superior court’s order “denying the motion of the people to reinstate the complaint or a portion thereof pursuant to Section 871.5.” (Pen. Code, § 1238, subd. (a)(9); see also id., § 871.5, subd. (f).) At the outset, the fact that orders denying a section 871.5 reinstatement motion appear in the list of orders appealable under sections 1235 and 1238 would seem to pose a problem for Hyatt’s position regarding the Court of Appeal’s exercise of jurisdiction here: as discussed above, those sections “apply only” 19  PEOPLE v. HYATT Opinion of the Court by Kruger, J. to appeals in a “felony case.” (§ 1235, subd. (a).) When a superior court denies a motion to reinstate a felony complaint, there has been no indictment, information, or complaint certified pursuant to Penal Code section 859a filed in the superior court. (Pen. Code, § 949.) Nevertheless, section 1238 plainly treats such denials as occurring in a felony case. This would appear to undermine Hyatt’s contention that no “felony case” arises from the filing and subsequent dismissal of a felony complaint. Hyatt responds by pointing to legislative history which, in his view, shows that subdivision (a)(9) was intended as a narrow exception to the general non-appealability of magistrate dismissals. Section 871.5 was first enacted in response to a perceived gap in the available pathways to appeal a magistrate’s order dismissing all or part of a felony complaint. Before unification, then-extant divisions of authority between magistrates and trial courts, on the one hand, and between Courts of Appeal and superior courts, on the other, gave rise to substantial uncertainties about whether magistrates had the power to dismiss felony complaints under various dismissal statutes directed at “courts,” and, if so, where an appeal from such dismissals would lie. (See generally People v. Mimms (1988) 204 Cal.App.3d 471, 475–480.) The Legislature responded in 1980 by enacting legislation that amended a number of statutory provisions to explicitly authorize magistrate dismissals. (See Landrum v. Superior Court (1981) 30 Cal.3d 1, 17, fn. 4.) At the same time, the Legislature enacted section 871.5 to “provid[e] a means by which the district attorney can