Does section 654 of the California Criminal Code allow a defendant to be convicted of assault with a deadly weapon on multiple victims?

Section 654 on its face makes no mention of an exception founded on defendant's commission of an act of violence on multiple victims during a crime episode. The word violence is found nowhere in the statute. Apparently the first reference to this notion came in People v. Brannon (1924) 70 Cal.App. 225, 233 P. 88 (Brannon ).⁸ Brannon is more appropriately seen as a double jeopardy case, not a separate punishment case. There the defendant was charged with one count of assault with a deadly weapon as to one victim and the murder of a second victim. Only one shot was fired at the two victims. The court held separate trials for the two crimes, and at the first trial the defendant was acquitted of assault with a deadly weapon. In the second trial he was found guilty of murder. The appellate court found the double jeopardy clause did not bar the second prosecution or conviction. The court reconciled two lines of double jeopardy cases from various jurisdictions across the country, and concluded there was no bar. Then the court considered section 654 :