Opinion
G060719
04-05-2022
THE PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. MARILYN KAY EDGE, Defendant and Appellant.
Susan L. Jordan, under appointment by the Court of Appeal, for Defendant and Appellant. No appearance for Plaintiff and Respondent.
NOT TO BE PUBLISHED
Appeal from a judgment of the Superior Court of Orange County No. 14ZF0336, Gary S. Paer, Judge. Affirmed.
Susan L. Jordan, under appointment by the Court of Appeal, for Defendant and Appellant.
No appearance for Plaintiff and Respondent.
OPINION
GOETHALS, J.
Marilyn Kay Edge is serving a sentence of life without the possibility of parole as a result of her 2015 guilty pleas to two counts of first-degree murder (Pen. Code, § 187, subd. (a)), and her admission at the same time that she committed multiple murders (§ 190.2, subd. (a)(3)). In 2021, Edge petitioned the court for resentencing pursuant to section 1170.95. That petition was denied in September of 2021. Edge now appeals from the trial court's denial of her petition.
All statutory references are to the Penal Code.
We appointed counsel to represent defendant on appeal. After conducting her analysis of potential appellate issues, counsel has informed us in her declaration that she has reviewed the appellate record, as has an attorney at Appellate Defenders, Inc. Counsel then filed a brief pursuant to the procedures set forth in People v. Wende (1979) 25 Cal.3d 436 and Anders v. California (1967) 386 U.S. 738. While not arguing against her client, counsel set forth the facts of the case and advised us she was unable to find an issue to argue on defendant's behalf. Counsel tells us she advised defendant in a letter dated November 15, 2021, that she had a right to file a written argument on her own behalf within thirty days of the date appellant's opening brief was filed. That time has now passed, and we have received no filing from defendant.
FACTS
The facts which underly this case are unquestionably tragic. We summarize them briefly to put our opinion into its proper perspective.
Marilyn Kay Edge was born and raised in Georgia where she met and married Mark Edge. Before long their son, Jaelen, was born. Jaelen suffered from severe autism which strained the Edge marriage to the point that the couple divorced in 2002. Nonetheless, several years later Marilyn gave birth to the couple's second child, Faith. As their relationship once again dissolved, a protracted custody battle over the two children ensued.
Because the parents share the same last name, we use their first names for clarity and ease of reference.
By 2013, Marilyn was living in Arizona with the two children while her former husband Mark remained in Georgia. That year she traveled to Georgia for a child custody hearing. On September 11, 2013, a Georgia judge awarded full custody of Jaelen and Faith to Mark Edge.
Marilyn was ordered to return the children to Mark by September 15. Instead of arranging the transfer of custody as ordered by the court, she began to consider how she might kill her children and herself. When Marilyn returned to Arizona, she purchased sleeping pills. She then traveled with Jaelen and Faith to Santa Ana, California, where she bought more sleeping pills. Marilyn later told a detective that she brought the children to Huntington Beach so they could enjoy the beach before she carried out her plan to kill them.
On September 13, 2013, Marilyn and the children were staying in a hotel room in Santa Ana. That evening, Marilyn killed both of the children in the hotel room. She drowned one child in the bathtub and smothered the other child with a pillow on the couch. She then unsuccessfully attempted to kill herself by driving her vehicle into a cement post at a Home Depot parking lot in Costa Mesa. When a Costa Mesa police officer arrived at the accident scene, Marilyn advised the officer she had killed her children at a hotel in Santa Ana. When Santa Ana police responded to the hotel room, they found both deceased children along with defendant's suicide note. Marilyn was arrested and transported to the Santa Ana Police Department where she was advised of her rights pursuant to Miranda v. Arizona (1966) 384 U.S. 436. She waived those rights and told the interviewing officer what she had done.
In 2014, the Orange County Grand Jury returned an indictment which charged defendant with two counts of premeditated and deliberate first-degree murder, along with two special circumstances: multiple murders (§ 190.2, subd. (a)(3)) and lying in wait (§ 190.2, subd. (a)(15)). At Marilyn's arraignment on the indictment, the public defender was appointed to represent her.
In December of 2015, defendant pleaded guilty to both counts of first-degree murder; at the same time she admitted the multiple murders special circumstance. Marilyn made this admission when she entered her guilty pleas: "September 13, 2013, I willfully premediated, deliberated and acted with intent to kill, and did kill Jaelen E. and Faith E., two human beings." She was thereafter sentenced to a term of life in prison without the possibility of parole.
In August of 2021, defendant filed her petition requesting that she be resentenced pursuant to section 1170.95. The trial court reappointed the public defender to represent her. The People filed an opposition to the petition in which they described the facts of this case as "heartbreaking." The People nonetheless opposed the petition, arguing that defendant was ineligible for relief because she "killed her children. She was not convicted under Felony Murder and/or murder pursuant to the Natural and Probable Consequences Doctrine. The Petitioner is ineligible for relief as a matter of law."
At a hearing conducted on September 10, 2021, during which defendant was represented by her trial counsel from the public defender's office, the court agreed with the People's position and denied the petition.
DISCUSSION
We have examined the entire record in this case, and we can find no error in the trial court's ruling. The court complied with the procedures required by People v. Lewis (2021) 11 Cal.5th 952, and correctly interpreted the language of section 1170.95. As sad and tragic as the facts of this case are, section 1170.95 provides no relief for an actual killer, which defendant clearly was.
Like counsel, we can find no other arguable appellate issue in this record.
DISPOSITION
The judgment is affirmed.
WE CONCUR: O'LEARY, P. J. MARKS, J. [*] --------- Notes: [*]Judge of the Orange County Superior Court, assigned by the Chief Justice pursuant to article VI, section 6 of the California Constitution.