Can a defendant enter a guilty plea in the Superior Court without having completed proceedings in the Municipal Court?

But the superior court did not mislead defendant. The superior court was only involved because the case was a capital case that required disbursement of investigative funds under section 987.9, and a municipal court judge was not empowered to disburse such funds. (See Anderson v. Justice Court , supra , 99 Cal.App.3d at p. 402, 160 Cal.Rptr. 274.) The case was not otherwise pending in the superior court, and the superior court therefore could not have accepted defendants guilty plea. Rather, the law required a magistrate to hold a preliminary hearing (or accept a waiver of such a hearing), and only then could defendant be held to answer in superior court and plead guilty. Defendant cites no authority for the proposition that in 1996, when municipal court judges sitting as magistrates conducted preliminary hearings in felony cases, a defendant in a case in which the punishment might be death could enter a guilty plea in superior court without first having completed proceedings in the municipal court. Here, the superior court judge who was holding the section 987.9 hearing while defendants case was otherwise in the municipal court could not accept defendants guilty plea. Hence, the superior court judge did not mislead defendant; rather, he sent defendant on the only path that would have allowed defendant to achieve his stated aim.