Gilroy City Councilman Charles Morales pleaded guilty Thursday
to driving under the influence of alcohol. Despite one prior DUI
conviction within the last seven years and a blood-alcohol level
nearly three times the legal limit, he won’t go to jail.
Morales will spend the 40 days he could have spent in San Benito
County Jail under house arrest. His movements will be monitored by
an electronic bracelet and supervised by San Benito County’s
probation department.
Gilroy City Councilman Charles Morales pleaded guilty Thursday to driving under the influence of alcohol. Despite one prior DUI conviction within the last seven years and a blood-alcohol level nearly three times the legal limit, he won’t go to jail.
Morales will spend the 40 days he could have spent in San Benito County Jail under house arrest. His movements will be monitored by an electronic bracelet and supervised by San Benito County’s probation department.
The sentence will not preclude Morales from City Council service. According to the Gilroy city charter, Section 406, Morales would forfeit his seat if he was absent without leave (in jail, for example) for 60 consecutive days or if he was convicted of a felony. A DUI with one prior offense in the last seven years is a misdemeanor.
Starting Dec. 21, Morales will be allowed to leave his house only at scheduled times to go to work, including on City Council business, and other excursions his probation officer approves in advance.
Morales was not in court Thursday, but his attorney, Milton Gonzales, of Gilroy, entered the plea on his behalf.
“Fortunately, Judge (Steven) Sanders had the judicial good sense to allow Mr. Morales on the Electronic Monitoring Program,” Gonzales said afterward. “This is a win-win resolution for both the San Benito court and for Mr. Morales.”
The county benefits, Gonzales said, because the Electronic Monitoring Program (EMP), makes money for the county instead of draining it, as incarceration does. Under the program, Morales will pay the county $13.50 a day, a total of $540. In addition, Sanders sentenced Morales to pay a fine of $1,974, attend a multiple DUI offender program and submit to a two-year driver’s license restriction in which he may only drive to and from work and his DUI program.
Morales retired Aug. 1 from his position as a youth probation officer at Harold Holden Ranch for Boys in Morgan Hill.
In Morales’ case, Gonzales added, home detainment is sufficient to prevent him from being a danger to society.
Morales submitted personal references in order to qualify for the EMP, Gonzales said.
“It’s totally within the judge’s discretion whether or not to use the EMP,” Santa Clara County Deputy District Attorney Mark Hood said from San Martin.
The Santa Clara County district attorneys are not a fan of it, Hood said. Because of San Benito County’s overcrowded jail, the EMP is a frequent substitute for jail time there, according to Arthur Cantu, a Hollister defense lawyer who regularly handles DUI cases.
Sanders is a predictable judge in that he has a schedule of sentences he uses. For a second DUI with a blood-alcohol level of more than 0.2, 40 days of EMP is a typical sentence for him and for the county, Cantu said.
“It is punitive,” Cantu said of the EMP. “Every one of my clients who has been under the electronic monitoring has said it does have a very punitive effect.”
John O’Brien, another Hollister defense lawyer who takes on many DUI cases and was a county deputy district attorney for eight years, described Sanders as “middle-of-the-road.” Before Morales’ Thursday court appearance, O’Brien predicted Sanders would give the councilman 40 to 50 days in jail.
The maximum incarceration time for misdemeanor DUI is one year.
Neither Sanders nor Deputy District Attorney Candice Hooper could be reached for comment by press time.
On June 29, a California Highway Patrol officer stopped Morales on state Highway 25, just around the San Benito/Santa Clara county line. Morales was on his way back to Gilroy from Hollister and was driving erratically, according to the officer. Breath and blood tests showed his blood-alcohol content to be above .23 percent. The legal limit is .08.
Gonzales and Morales had this blood sample retested at a private lab in Alameda, but the results came back the same, according to Gonzales’ legal assistant, Robert Landry.
Morales was on Santa Clara County court probation at the time from a 1999 DUI conviction, but the court there did not file a violation charge before the probation expired on Aug. 17. Once the probation is finished, no violation charges can be pressed.
On Dec. 11, 1999, Morales was arrested in San Martin with a blood-alcohol level of 0.18 and a minor in the car. Shortly afterward, he admitted to The Dispatch that he was convicted of DUI once before in the 1980s. Santa Clara County court records show that charges were filed against Morales in 1983 and 1989, but it’s unknown whether these were DUI cases as the records have been purged.
