California, United States of America
The following excerpt is from People v. Matthews, E052977 (Cal. App. 2012):
punishments for criminal convictions curtail an offender's freedoms, a court granting probation may impose reasonable conditions that deprive the offender of some freedoms enjoyed by law-abiding citizens.' [Citation.]" (People v. Barajas (2011) 198 Cal.App.4th 748, 753.) Since it is impossible to travel or to associate freely with persons of one's choice from inside a prison cell, probation is generally a great deal for the grantee. If defendant felt otherwise, she was free to refuse probation, and instead serve her sentence. (Rubics, supra, 136 Cal.App.4th at p. 459.)
Moreover, "In evaluating the validity of a condition of probation, the issue is not the impact of the condition on the defendant's constitutional rights but its ability to meet the standard set forth in [Lent]." (Gilliam v. Municipal Court (1979) 97 Cal.App.3d 704, 708.) The conditions requiring defendant to obtain her probation officer's approval of her residence and plans to change it, meet the Lent standard. Choosing or changing a place of residence is not itself criminal conduct, but there are many instances where, as here, the choice is related to both the current offense and to the risk of future criminality. A residence may have been used to promote the criminal venture; it may be in a place or with people involved in concealing or facilitating the crime; and it may make a future crime of the same sort likely. On probation for check fraud in Texas, defendant took up residence in California where she used her home and the internet to meet and establish a relationship with a new victim. To circumvent the conditions imposed by Texas, she deposited the victim's money into an account shared and managed by her mother, who, in turn, repeatedly allowed her access to that money in violation of the state's probation condition.
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