Case Title: P. v. Bland

Citation: 

Docket Number: S097340

State: california

Court: California Supreme Court

Date: 2002-07-01T00:00:00Z

Document:
1
Filed 7/1/02
IN THE SUPREME COURT OF CALIFORNIA
THE PEOPLE,
)
)
Plaintiff and Respondent,
)
)
S097340
v.
)
)
Ct.App. 2/1 B140775
JOMO K. BLAND,
)
)
Los Angeles County
Defendant and Appellant.
)
Super. Ct. No. NA040003
__________________________________ )
We granted review to resolve issues involving transferred intent and
proximate causation.
In its classic form, the doctrine of transferred intent applies when the
defendant intends to kill one person but mistakenly kills another.  The intent to kill
the intended target is deemed to transfer to the unintended victim so that the
defendant is guilty of murder.  (See generally People v. Scott (1996) 14 Cal.4th
544 (Scott).)  Whatever its theoretical underpinnings, this result is universally
accepted.  But conceptual difficulties arise when applying the doctrine to other
facts.  Here, defendant shot at three persons, killing one and injuring, but not
killing, the other two.  A jury convicted him of one first degree murder and two
premeditated attempted murders.  We must decide whether defendant’s intent to
kill the murder victim transfers to an alleged attempted murder victim.
We conclude that transferred intent applies even when the person kills the
intended target.  Intent to kill is not limited to the specific target but extends to
2
everyone actually killed.  We also conclude, however, that the doctrine does not
apply to an inchoate crime like attempted murder.  A person who intends to kill
only one is guilty of the attempted (or completed) murder of that one but not also
of the attempted murder of others the person did not intend to kill.  Thus, in this
case, whether defendant is guilty of the attempted murder of the two surviving
victims depends on his mental state as to those victims and not on his mental state
as to the intended victim.  Finally, we conclude that the trial court did not
prejudicially misinstruct the jury as to these principles.
The jury also found true sentence enhancement allegations that defendant
intentionally and personally discharged a firearm and proximately caused great
bodily injury or death.  (Pen. Code, § 12022.53, subd. (d); hereafter section
12022.53(d).)  The trial court instructed the jury on the elements of this allegation,
but did not define proximate causation.  We conclude the court erred in not
defining proximate causation, but the error was harmless.  A correct instruction on
proximate causation could not have aided defendant.
Accordingly, we reverse the judgment of the Court of Appeal, which
reversed the attempted murder convictions and enhancement findings.
I.  FACTS AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY
Defendant was a member of the Insane Crips gang.  Murder victim Kenneth
Wilson, nicknamed Kebo, belonged to the Rolling 20’s Crips.  In the evening of
March 6, 1999, Wilson drove through a Long Beach neighborhood with
passengers Skylar Morgan and Leon Simon, who, it appears, were not gang
members.  Stating that he saw someone he knew, Wilson turned his car around and
drove to where defendant was standing with another man.  The other man pulled
out a gun, and defendant asked Wilson if he was Kebo.  Wilson said he was, and
the man put the gun away.
3
The other man said he and defendant were Insane Crips.  Wilson  told them
his passengers, Morgan and Simon, were not gang members.  Invited to get out of
the car and talk, Wilson instead turned his car around again.  He said he would
drop off his passengers and return.  Defendant approached the driver’s side of the
car, said, “So you Kebo from 20’s,” and started shooting into the vehicle with a
.38-caliber handgun.  Wilson managed to start driving away.  As he did so, both
defendant and the other man fired at the car.  The car crashed into a pole.  Wilson
died of a gunshot wound to the chest.  Simon was shot in the liver and Morgan in
the shoulder, but both survived.  The evidence was not clear who fired the shots
that hit Morgan and Simon.
As relevant here, a jury convicted defendant of the first degree murder of
Wilson and the premeditated attempted murders of Simon and Morgan.  It also
found true as to these counts that he “intentionally and personally discharged a
firearm and proximately caused great bodily injury . . . or death to any person
other than an accomplice . . . .”  (§ 12022.53(d).)  The Court of Appeal reversed
the two attempted murder convictions, finding the trial court erroneously
instructed the jury on the doctrine of transferred intent.  It also reversed the
remaining section 12022.53(d) enhancement, finding the court prejudicially erred
in not defining proximate causation.  Justice Ortega dissented on both points.
We granted the Attorney General’s petition for review.
4
II.  DISCUSSION
A.  Transferred Intent 1
1.  Procedural Background
One possible interpretation of the evidence is that defendant intended to kill
the one he and his cohort did kill—Wilson, the rival gang member—but he did not
specifically target nonmembers Morgan and Simon.  In his opening argument to
the jury, the prosecutor argued that defendant intended to kill Morgan and Simon.
But he also argued that “the defendant is actually pointing a gun and pulling the
trigger.  The intent, as we say in the law, follows the bullet; wherever you are
pointing it, that’s where it goes.”  In his argument, defense counsel responded that
there was no evidence that any of the shots were aimed at Morgan or Simon.  In
reply, the prosecutor said, “One of the other things counsel said concerning the
attempt murder counts . . . one of the instructions talks about that, it is the concept
of transfer intent.  You don’t get a benefit if you try to kill one person and
inadvertently kill another, that that was not your intent.  An attempt follows the
bullets, kills a different person, the crime so committed is the same as though you
originally had given that intended target.  The law does not excuse bad
marksmanship or hitting other people.  He is responsible for each of those acts.”
                                                
1 
The term “transferred intent,” if taken literally, is underinclusive.  In his
concurring opinion in Scott, Justice Mosk suggested that the term “transferred
malice” might be more accurate (Scott, supra, 14 Cal.4th at p. 554 (conc. opn. of
Mosk, J.)), but even that term is too narrow.  Someone who premeditates a killing
but kills the wrong person is guilty of a premeditated, not just intentional, murder.
(People v. Sanchez (2001) 26 Cal.4th 834, 850-851.)  A more accurate designation
might be “transferred mental state.”  However, because the term “transferred
intent” is so well established in the cases, we will continue to use it on the
understanding that it is not limited merely to intent but extends at least to
premeditation.
5
After the arguments, the prosecution requested that the jury instructions
include one on “transferred intent” pursuant to CALJIC No. 8.65.  He explained
that “the argument of the defense was basically [defendant] didn’t necessarily
intend to shoot the other people.  And I felt it necessary to respond to that with
transfer intent.”  The court agreed to give the instruction and thus told the jury:
“When one attempts to kill a certain person, but by mistake or inadvertence kills a
different person, the crime, if any, so committed is the same as though the person
originally intended to be killed, had been killed.”  (CALJIC No. 8.65.)
During deliberations, the jury asked the court, “Does finding premeditation
in count 1 [murder of Wilson] follow over to count 3 [attempted murder of
Morgan]?”  In open court, the foreperson said that regarding count three, “We
seem to be unable to distinguish willful, deliberate and premeditation. . . .  [W]e
see quite clearly that it is willful and possibly deliberate but the word ‘and’ [in the
instruction] is causing a problem because we are having difficulty as a group
establishing that there is premeditation in that particular count 3.”  The court
explained that the jury had to “make a distinct finding for each count where that
question arises.  It arises in counts 1, 2 and 3.  So what you will need to do is make
a determination specifically as to each count, whether you find willful, malicious,
premeditation, if you find those as to each count.  You make a separate finding.
[¶]  You may find, for instance, that it applies . . . as to count 1, but you may find
that there are some facts or distinction between count 1, count 2 and count 3 in
which you don’t find all of those factors existent.  That’s okay to do that.  One
does not necessarily lead and follow to the other.  You have to look at each count
separately.”
Outside the jury’s presence, the prosecutor asked the court to reread
CALJIC Nos. 8.65, 8.66 (defining attempted murder), and 8.67 (defining the
“willful, deliberate, and premeditated” requirements of the attempted murder
6
charges).  The court then referred the jury to “three jury instructions that may
assist you in reaching a determination.  One is 8.65, the other is 8.66, and the third
is 8.67.  Those are instructions that had been read to you and they are within the
packet.  If you wish to take a look at those, it may be helpful.  [¶]  With respect to
each count, each count is determined separately one from another.  So a finding on
one does not necessarily lead to a finding on another.  It may assist.  [¶]  And,
lastly, you are correct in that the finding of the particular factors is in the
conjunctive, that is, that you must find all of the factors or you are unable to make
the finding.”
The foreperson said the comments helped, and the jury resumed
deliberating, eventually reaching its verdict without further communication with
the court.
2.  The Applicable Law
“Murder is the unlawful killing of a human being, or a fetus, with malice
aforethought.”  (Pen. Code, § 187, subd. (a).)  Except for the reference to a fetus,
the Legislature enacted this statute in 1872 intending to codify the common law of
murder.  (Keeler v. Superior Court (1970) 2 Cal.3d 619, 624-625.)  Transferred
intent was one of the common law doctrines that “survived the enactment of
California’s murder statute.”  (Scott, supra, 14 Cal.4th at p. 549, citing People v.
Suesser (1904) 142 Cal. 354, 366-367.)  “Under the classic formulation of
California’s common law doctrine of transferred intent, a defendant who shoots
with the intent to kill a certain person and hits a bystander instead is subject to the
same criminal liability that would have been imposed had ‘ “the fatal blow
reached the person for whom intended.” ’  (People v. Suesser (1904) 142 Cal. 354,
366 . . . .)  In such a factual setting, the defendant is deemed as culpable as if he
had accomplished what he set out to do.”  (Scott, supra, at p. 546.)
7
In Scott, we upheld convictions of both the murder of an unintended victim
who was killed and attempted murder of the intended target, who survived.  (Scott,
supra, 14 Cal.4th 544.)  Here, arguably, the reverse occurred:  defendant killed his
intended target and wounded but did not kill unintended victims.  Thus, the
question is whether transferred intent applies to attempted murder charges when
the defendant kills his sole intended target and shoots but does not kill others.
Although the briefs and cases have generally analyzed this as a single question, we
actually have two distinct questions best analyzed separately:  (1)  Does an intent
to kill transfer to an unintended victim when the intended target is killed?  (2)
Does transferred intent apply to attempted murder?
a.  Transferred Intent Applies When the Intended Target Is Killed
In People v. Birreuta (1984) 162 Cal.App.3d 454 (Birreuta), the defendant
was convicted of two first degree murders.  He denied intending to kill one of the
victims.  The court instructed the jury on transferred intent.  The Court of Appeal
found the instruction erroneous, reasoning that transferred intent does not apply
when the intended target is killed.  “The function of the transferred intent doctrine
is to insure the adequate punishment of those who accidentally kill innocent
bystanders, while failing to kill their intended victims.  But for the transferred
intent doctrine, such people could escape punishment for murder, even though
they deliberately and premeditatedly killed—because of their ‘lucky’ mistake. . . .
[¶]  When the intended victim is killed, however, there is no need for such an
artificial doctrine.  The defendant’s premeditation, deliberation, intent to kill and
malice aforethought are all directly employable in the prosecution for murdering
his intended victim.  The accidental killing may thus be prosecuted as a
manslaughter or second degree murder without ignoring the most culpable mental
elements of the situation. . . .  [¶]  We conclude that the interests of justice are best
8
served by differentiating between killers who premeditatedly and deliberately kill
two people, and killers who only intend to kill one person, and accidentally kill
another.  Both types should be punished for both killings, but the former type is
clearly more culpable.  In the first situation, the killer has committed two intended
first degree murders.  In the second situation . . . the killer has committed one first
degree murder and one second degree murder or manslaughter.  If the transferred
intent doctrine is applicable when the intended victim is killed, this difference
disappears.  Accordingly, we hold that the transferred intent doctrine does not
apply in this case because . . . the intended victim . . . was killed.”  (Id. at pp. 460-
461.)
The Birreuta court cited but found unpersuasive contrary dicta in an earlier
case.  (Birreuta, supra, 162 Cal.App.3d at pp. 458-459, citing People v. Carlson
(1974) 37 Cal.App.3d 349.)  In Carlson, the defendant was convicted of voluntary
manslaughter of his wife and murder of the fetus she was carrying.  The court
applied transferred intent.  “If, under the evidence, defendant intended to kill his
wife but by accident or inadvertence he killed the unborn child, the proper
principle to be applied is that which operates under the doctrine of ‘transferred
intent.’ ”  (People v. Carlson, supra, 37 Cal.App.3d at p. 356.)  The court had “no
doubt that the doctrine of ‘transferred intent’ applies even though the original
object of the assault is killed as well as the person whose death was the accidental
or the unintended result of the intent to kill the former.”  (Id. at p. 357.)  This
language was, as Birreuta noted, dicta because the Carlson court ultimately
reversed the murder conviction on unrelated grounds.  (Id. at pp. 357-358.)
There is some force to Birreuta’s argument that a person who intends to kill
two persons and does so is more culpable than a person who only intends to kill
one but kills two.  But we find no legally cognizable difference between the two
persons.  Because the facts in Scott did not present the Birreuta question, we
9
“decline[d] to express a view on that decision.”  (Scott, supra, 14 Cal.4th at p.
552.)  But Scott is instructive.  There we affirmed convictions of two crimes
against separate victims based on an intent to kill—attempted murder and, on a
transferred intent theory, murder—even though the defendant may have intended
to kill only one person.  We rejected the defendant’s argument that he was
improperly “being prosecuted as if he intended to kill two people rather than one.”
(Id. at p. 551.)  “Contrary to what its name implies, the transferred intent doctrine
does not refer to any actual intent that is capable of being ‘used up’ once it is
employed to convict a defendant of a specific intent crime against the intended
victim.”  (Id. at p. 550.)
Similarly, a person’s intent to kill the intended target is not “used up” once
it is employed to convict the person of murdering that target.  It can also be used to
convict of the murder of others the person also killed.  When one intends to kill
and does so, the killing is hardly an accident, even if the specific victim or victims
are unintended.  (Cf. Birreuta, supra, 162 Cal.App.3d at p. 460 [referring to
“accidentally kill[ing] innocent bystanders”].)  The Birreuta court believed there is
no need to transfer intent when the intended target is killed because the defendant
can be convicted of murder of the intended victim.  (Ibid.)  But this point is not
dispositive.  It may not be necessary to find that intent to kill extends to all
persons actually killed, but we believe it is appropriate to do so.
The Birreuta rule presents conceptual difficulties under other facts.
Birreuta says that a person who, premeditatedly intending to kill one person, kills
the target and an unintended victim is guilty of one first degree murder and one
second degree murder or perhaps manslaughter.  But what if, instead of killing the
target, the same person with the same intent kills two unintended targets?  Is that
person guilty of two first degree murders or, like the person who kills two
including the target, only of one first degree murder and one lesser crime?
10
Birreuta would seem to permit only one conviction of first degree murder.  But if
so, how?  Is the transferred intent “used up” once it is transferred to one victim?
How can that be reconciled with Scott?  Moreover, if it is used up, on which of the
two unintended victims is it used?  Which of the unintended victims, who are
equally dead and to whom the person had the same mental state, was the victim of
a first degree murder and which of a lesser crime?  How can a court make this
sensible to a jury?
Justice Mosk’s concurring opinion in Scott, which reached the same result
as the majority but by a different, and broader, route, supports the conclusion that
Birreuta was incorrect.  He rejected the “assumption” that “malice aforethought
exists in the perpetrator only in relation to an intended victim.”  (Scott, supra, 14
Cal.4th at p. 555 (conc. opn. of Mosk, J.).)  Instead, he argued, malice, either
express or implied, “does not exist in the perpetrator only in relation to an
intended victim.  True, an unlawful intent to kill almost always happens to be
directed at an intended victim. . . .  But there is no requirement of an unlawful
intent to kill an intended victim.  The law speaks in terms of an unlawful intent to
kill a person, not the person intended to be killed.  (See Pen. Code, § 188
[providing that malice aforethought is ‘express when there is manifested a
deliberate intention unlawfully to take away the life of a fellow creature’] . . . .)”
(Id. at pp. 555-556.)
Whether one conceptualizes the matter by saying that the intent to kill the
intended target transfers to others also killed, or by saying that intent to kill need
not be directed at a specific person, the result is the same:  assuming legal
causation, a person maliciously intending to kill is guilty of the murder of all
11
persons actually killed.  If the intent is premeditated, the murder or murders are
first degree.2
Cases from other jurisdictions have not treated Birreuta, supra, 162
Cal.App.3d 454, kindly.  Several have expressly disagreed with it.  (State v.
Hinton (Conn. 1993) 630 A.2d 593, 598-599; Ochoa v. State (Nev. 1999) 981 P.2d
1201, 1204-1205; State v. Worlock (N.J. 1990) 569 A.2d 1314, 1325; State v.
Fennell (S.C. 2000) 531 S.E.2d 512, 515-518 [but citing Scott, supra, 14 Cal.4th
544, with approval].)  The three later opinions each quote with approval the New
Jersey Supreme Court:  “When a defendant contemplates or designs the death of
another, the purpose of deterrence is better served by holding that defendant
responsible for the knowing or purposeful murder of the unintended as well as the
intended victim.  Hence, we reject defendant’s argument that the successful killing
of the intended victim prevents the ‘transfer’ of that intent to an unintended
victim.”  (State v. Worlock, supra, 569 A.2d at p. 1325.)  The Connecticut
Supreme Court added that “the law does not give the defendant a discount on the
second and subsequent victims of his intentional conduct.”  (State v. Hinton,
                                                
2 
Some commentators have criticized use of the transferred intent doctrine,
although generally not the result.  In Scott, we noted that Dean Prosser “aptly
describes it [as] a ‘bare-faced’ legal fiction.”  (Scott, supra, 14 Cal.4th at p. 550,
citing Prosser, Transferred Intent (1967) 45 Tex. L.Rev. 650, 650; see also Scott,
supra, at p. 554 (conc. opn. of Mosk, J.) [describing it as “a peculiarly
mischievous legal fiction”].)  Perkins, perhaps the doctrine’s harshest critic, argues
that it “has no proper place in criminal law” because it “has the vice of being a
misleading half-truth, often given as an improper reason for a correct result, but
incapable of strict application.”  (Perkins & Boyce, Criminal Law (3d ed. 1982)
ch. 7, § 8, p. 921.)
Nevertheless, because courts in this state and throughout the nation have
long discussed the problem in terms of transferred intent, we think it preferable to
continue to use the familiar term, while hopefully clarifying when and how the
doctrine does and does not apply.  (See fn. 1, ante.)
12
supra, 630 A.2d at p. 598.)  Other cases predated Birreuta but reached the
opposite conclusion.  (United States v. Sampol (D.C. Cir. 1980) 636 F.2d 621, 674
[“There are even stronger grounds for applying the principle [transferred intent]
where the intended victim is killed by the same act that kills the unintended
victim”]; United States v. Weddell (8th Cir. 1977) 567 F.2d 767, 769-770.)3
The court in Harvey v. State (Md.Ct.Spec.App. 1996) 681 A.2d 628
considered this question in detail.  It first discussed the conceptual difficulties it
presents.  “Some of the early, and simplistic, explanations of the transferred intent
doctrine gave rise to some troubling conceptual problems.  The classic formulation
envisioned a single actus reus—the death of the unintended victim.  If the single
mens rea—the specific intent to kill the intended victim, e.g.—could then be
‘transferred’ to the unintended victim, the unitary mens rea could combine with
the unitary actus reus to produce one unitary and doctrinally tidy crime. . . .  [¶]
The simple arithmetic explanation proved inadequate, however, when there was
more than one actus reus.  Suppose, in addition to the death of the unintended
victim, the intended victim had also been killed or, at least, wounded by the bullet
in its flight.  If the mens rea had to be used to prove the crime against the intended
victim, what was then left to be ‘transferred’ to the case involving the unintended
victim?  The conceptual problem also arose even where the deadly force missed
                                                
3 
In Ford v. State (Md. 1992) 625 A.2d 984, the Maryland Court of Appeals
cited Birreuta, supra, 162 Cal.App.3d 454, with approval but, as we discuss in the
next subpart, that decision presents the question whether transferred intent applies
to an inchoate crime like attempted murder and not the Birreuta issue.  The same
court later said that it “stated in Ford that transferred intent does not apply to
attempted murder.”  (Poe v. State (Md. 1996) 671 A.2d 501, 504 [presenting the
same issue as in Scott, supra, 14 Cal.4th 544, and deciding it the same way].)  A
concurring opinion in Ford signed by three justices disagreed with Birreuta’s
holding.  (Ford v. State, supra, at pp. 1004-1005 (conc. opn. of McAuliffe, J.).)
13
the intended victim completely but the State nonetheless sought to charge the
assailant with the inchoate crime of intent to murder or assault with intent to
murder.  If the mens rea were in limited supply, to which of two crimes should it
be allocated?  How could a single mens rea be made to do double duty?”  (Id. at
pp. 636-637.)
The court then supplied the answer.  As we did in Scott, supra, 14 Cal.4th
544, it rejected the notion that transferring the intent uses it up.  “By thinking of
the mens rea in such finite terms—as some discrete unit that must be either here or
there—we have created a linguistic problem for ourselves where no real-life
problem existed.  Criminal acts, consummated or inchoate, are discrete events that
can be both pinpointed and counted.  A mens rea, by contrast, is an elastic thing of
unlimited supply.  It neither follows nor fails to follow the bullet.  It does not go
anywhere.  It remains in the brain of the criminal actor and never moves.  It may
combine with a single actus reus to make a single crime.  It may as readily
combine with a hundred acti rei, intended and unintended, to make a hundred
crimes, consummated and inchoate.  Unforeseen circumstances may multiply the
criminal acts for which the criminal agent is responsible.  A single state of mind,
however, will control the fact of guilt and the level of guilt of them all.”  (Harvey
v. State, supra, 681 A.2d at p. 637.)
Relying heavily on Poe v. State, supra, 671 A.2d 501—Maryland’s
equivalent of Scott, supra, 14 Cal.4th 544—the court concluded that “the guilt of
the assailant (or his accomplice) vis-a-vis the unintended victim was unaffected by
the fate of the intended victim.  As far as the case with respect to the unintended
victim was concerned, it made no difference whether the intended victim had been
1) aimed at and missed, 2) hit but only wounded, or 3) hit and killed.  It similarly
made no difference whether the assailant (and/or accomplice) had been charged
with a crime against the intended victim or not.  There was no danger of depleting
14
the mens rea.  [¶]  The ‘transferred’ mens rea vis-a-vis the unintended victim or
victims will not be affected in any way, therefore, by what happens to the intended
victim.”  (Harvey v. State, supra, 681 A.2d at p. 637.)
We conclude that Birreuta, supra, 162 Cal.App.3d 454, was incorrect and
disapprove it to the extent it is inconsistent with our opinion.  Intent to kill
transfers to an unintended homicide victim even if the intended target is killed.4
b.  Transferred Intent Does Not Apply to Attempted Murder
“The business of ‘transferring’ the mens rea of a specific intent to kill from
an intended victim to an unintended victim (or, more properly, simply applying it
to the unintended victim) becomes far more complex when dealing with inchoate
criminal homicides such as . . . attempted murder . . . .”  (Harvey v. State, supra,
681 A.2d at p. 639.)  Two California decisions have concluded that transferred
intent does not apply to attempted murder.  (People v. Czahara (1988) 203
Cal.App.3d 1468, 1471 (Czahara); People v. Calderon (1991) 232 Cal.App.3d
930, 935 (Calderon); see also People v. Chinchilla (1997) 52 Cal.App.4th 683,
688, citing Czahara with approval.)  These cases disagreed with earlier decisions
that assumed, without analysis, that transferred intent does apply to attempted
murder.  (People v. Flores (1986) 178 Cal.App.3d 74, 80-82; People v. Neal
(1950) 97 Cal.App.2d 668, 672-673.)
In Czahara, the defendant shot at and injured two persons—Christie and
Johnson—for which he was convicted of two attempted murders.  The evidence
suggested the defendant may have intended to kill Christie but not Johnson.  The
                                                
4 
This conclusion does not mean that a person is always liable for all deaths
that result from an act with a malicious state of mind.  As Justice Mosk noted in
Scott, proximate causation is also required for each death.  (Scott, supra, 14
Cal.4th at p. 556, fn. 1 (conc. opn. of Mosk, J.); see generally People v. Cervantes
(2001) 26 Cal.4th 860.)
15
trial court instructed on transferred intent.  The Court of Appeal found the
instruction erroneous.  It agreed with the authors of a leading treatise who “argue
that [transferred intent] should not apply at all to attempted homicides, as the
assailant can be punished directly for an attempt on the intended victim:  ‘If,
without justification, excuse or mitigation D with intent to kill A fires a shot which
misses A but unexpectedly inflicts a non-fatal injury upon B, D is guilty of an
attempt to commit murder,—but the attempt was to murder A whom D was trying
to kill and not B who was hit quite accidentally.  And so far as the criminal law is
concerned there is no transfer of this intent one to the other so as to make D guilty
of an attempt to murder B.’ ”  (Czahara, supra, 203 Cal.App.3d at p. 1474,
quoting Perkins & Boyce, Criminal Law, supra, ch. 7, § 8, p. 925.)  The court then
applied this conclusion to its facts:  “If Czahara aimed only at Christie, intending
to kill only her, then he was attempting to kill only her.  He was prosecuted and
convicted of that attempt.  There was no need to employ the legal fiction of
transferred intent in order to fully punish him for the attempt.  Again assuming
that he had no intent to shoot Johnson, that shooting should be punished according
to the culpability which the law assigns it, but no more.”  (Czahara, supra, 203
Cal.App.3d at p. 1475.)  It summarized the rule:  “[W]here a single act is alleged
to be an attempt on two persons’ lives, the intent to kill should be evaluated
independently as to each victim, and the jury should not be instructed to transfer
intent from one to another.”  (Ibid.)
In Calderon, the defendant shot at and intended to kill one person, but
missed and hit instead a nearby child.  The child survived.  The defendant was
convicted of attempting to murder both the intended target and, on a transferred
intent theory, the child.  The Court of Appeal followed Czahara, supra, 203
Cal.App.3d 1468, and concluded transferred intent does not apply.  “The crime of
attempted murder may be committed whether or not the intended victim is actually
16
injured.  Calderon therefore committed a completed crime against his intended
victim which is as serious as the greatest level of culpability which could be
achieved by transferring that intent to his unintended victim, obviating the need to
apply the doctrine.”  (Calderon, supra, 232 Cal.App.3d at p. 936.)
We agree with these decisions.  We explained above that intent to kill is not
“used up” with the killing of the intended target but extends to every person
actually killed.  But this rationale does not apply to persons not killed.  We see no
suggestion the Legislature intended to extend liability for unintended victims to an
inchoate crime like attempted murder.  The crime of attempt sanctions what the
person intended to do but did not accomplish, not unintended and unaccomplished
potential consequences.
The mental state required for attempted murder has long differed from that
required for murder itself.  Murder does not require the intent to kill.  Implied
malice—a conscious disregard for life—suffices.  (People v. Lasko (2000) 23
Cal.4th 101, 107.)  But over a century ago, we made clear that implied malice
cannot support a conviction of an attempt to commit murder.  “ ‘To constitute
murder, the guilty person need not intend to take life; but to constitute an attempt
to murder, he must so intend.’  [Citation.]  ‘The wrong-doer must specifically
contemplate taking life; and though his act is such as, were it successful, would be
murder, if in truth he does not mean to kill, he does not become guilty of an
attempt to commit murder.’  [Citation.] ”  (People v. Mize (1889) 80 Cal. 41, 43,
quoted in People v. Murtishaw (1981) 29 Cal.3d 733, 764; see also People v.
Collie (1981) 30 Cal.3d 43, 61-62.)
We should also distinguish between a completed murder and attempted
murder regarding transferred intent.  Someone who in truth does not intend to kill
a person is not guilty of that person’s attempted murder even if the crime would
have been murder—due to transferred intent—if the person were killed.  To be
17
guilty of attempted murder, the defendant must intend to kill the alleged victim,
not someone else.  The defendant’s mental state must be examined as to each
alleged attempted murder victim.  Someone who intends to kill only one person
and attempts unsuccessfully to do so, is guilty of the attempted murder of the
intended victim, but not of others.
The Maryland Court of Appeals has also considered this question and
reached the same conclusion.5  It drew an apt analogy between transferred intent
and the felony murder rule, which imposes murder liability for a death that occurs
during the commission of certain felonies.  (See generally People v. Hansen
(1994) 9 Cal.4th 300, 308.)  “Both doctrines [transferred intent and felony murder]
are used to impose criminal liability for unintended deaths.  [Citation.]  Clearly,
there is no crime of attempted felony murder when no death occurs during the
course of a felony.  [Citation.]  Likewise, the doctrine of transferred intent does
not apply to attempted murder when there is no death.”  (Poe v. State, supra, 671
A.2d at p. 504.)
In another case, it discussed yet another reason not to apply transferred
intent to an inchoate crime like attempted murder.  “A related reason why
                                                
5 
Florida has also refused to extend transferred intent to attempted murder.
(Shellman v. State (Fla.Dist.Ct.App. 1993) 620 So.2d 1010.)  A Nevada case
involving facts similar to this case does apply transferred intent to attempted
murder.  (Ochoa v. State, supra, 981 P.2d 1201.)  The Ochoa court discussed and
disagreed with Birreuta, supra, 162 Cal.App.3d 454, and concluded—as we do—
that transferred intent “applies regardless of whether or not the intended victim
was injured.”  (Ochoa v. State, supra, 981 P.2d at pp. 1204-1205.)  It never
discussed the separate question of whether transferred intent applies to attempted
murder.  For this reason, we find that decision unpersuasive.  We also find
unpersuasive a New Mexico intermediate appellate court decision predating
Czahara, supra, 203 Cal.App.3d 1468, and Calderon, supra, 232 Cal.App.3d 930,
that concluded transferred intent applies to attempted murder.  (State v. Gillette
(N.M.Ct.App. 1985) 699 P.2d 626, 634-636.)
18
transferred intent cannot properly apply to attempted murder derives from the fact
that the crime of attempted murder requires no physical injury to the victim [a
circumstance noted in Calderon, supra, 232 Cal.App.3d at p. 936]. . . .  Assuming
an attempted murder scenario where the defendant fires a shot at an intended
victim and no bystanders are physically injured, one sees that it is virtually
impossible to decide to whom the defendant’s intent should be transferred.  Is the
intent to murder transferred to everyone in proximity to the path of the bullet?  Is
the intent transferred to everyone frightened and thereby assaulted by the shot?
There is no rational method for deciding how the defendant’s intent to murder
should be transferred.”  (Ford v. State, supra, 625 A.2d at p. 1000.)
This concern is real.  The world contains many people a murderous
assailant does not intend to kill.  Obviously, intent to kill one person cannot
transfer to the entire world.  But how can a jury rationally decide which of many
persons the defendant did not intend to kill were attempted murder victims on a
transferred intent theory?  To how many unintended persons can an intent to kill
be transferred?  Just as acts with implied malice constitute murder of anyone
actually killed, but not attempted murder of others, so, too, acts with the intent to
kill one person constitute murder of anyone actually killed, but not attempted
murder of others.
The conclusion that transferred intent does not apply to attempted murder
still permits a person who shoots at a group of people to be punished for the
actions towards everyone in the group even if that person primarily targeted only
one of them.  As to the nontargeted members of the group, the defendant might be
guilty of crimes such as assault with a deadly weapon or firing at an occupied
vehicle.  (See Czahara, supra, 203 Cal.App.3d at p. 1475.)  More importantly, the
person might still be guilty of attempted murder of everyone in the group,
although not on a transferred intent theory.  The Ford court discussed this last
19
point in explaining why one of its earlier cases (State v. Wilson (Md. 1988) 546
A.2d 1041) correctly affirmed attempted murder convictions even though it erred
in relying on transferred intent.  “The result in Wilson can best be explained and
justified by distinguishing between transferred intent and what is essentially
concurrent intent.”  (Ford v. State, supra, 625 A.2d at p. 1000.)
The Ford court explained that although the intent to kill a primary target
does not transfer to a survivor, the fact the person desires to kill a particular target
does not preclude finding that the person also, concurrently, intended to kill others
within what it termed the “kill zone.”  “The intent is concurrent . . . when the
nature and scope of the attack, while directed at a primary victim, are such that we
can conclude the perpetrator intended to ensure harm to the primary victim by
harming everyone in that victim’s vicinity.  For example, an assailant who places a
bomb on a commercial airplane intending to harm a primary target on board
ensures by this method of attack that all passengers will be killed.  Similarly,
consider a defendant who intends to kill A and, in order to ensure A’s death,
drives by a group consisting of A, B, and C, and attacks the group with automatic
weapon fire or an explosive device devastating enough to kill everyone in the
group.  The defendant has intentionally created a ‘kill zone’ to ensure the death of
his primary victim, and the trier of fact may reasonably infer from the method
employed an intent to kill others concurrent with the intent to kill the primary
victim.  When the defendant escalated his mode of attack from a single bullet
aimed at A’s head to a hail of bullets or an explosive device, the factfinder can
infer that, whether or not the defendant succeeded in killing A, the defendant
concurrently intended to kill everyone in A’s immediate vicinity to ensure A’s
death.  The defendant’s intent need not be transferred from A to B, because
although the defendant’s goal was to kill A, his intent to kill B was also direct; it
was concurrent with his intent to kill A.  Where the means employed to commit
20
the crime against a primary victim create a zone of harm around that victim, the
factfinder can reasonably infer that the defendant intended that harm to all who are
in the anticipated zone.  This situation is distinct from the ‘depraved heart’ [i.e.,
implied malice] situation because the trier of fact may infer the actual intent to kill
which is lacking in a ‘depraved heart’ [implied malice] scenario.”  (Ford v. State,
supra, 625 A.2d at pp. 1000-1001, fn. omitted.)
California cases that have affirmed convictions requiring the intent to kill
persons other than the primary target can be considered “kill zone” cases even
though they do not employ that term.  In People v. Vang (2001) 87 Cal.App.4th
554, 563-565, for example, defendants shot at two occupied houses.  The Court of
Appeal affirmed attempted murder charges as to everyone in both houses—11
counts—even though the defendants may have targeted only one person at each
house.  “The jury drew a  reasonable inference, in light of the placement of the
shots, the number of shots, and the use of high-powered, wall-piercing weapons,
that defendants harbored a specific intent to kill every living being within the
residences they shot up. . . .  The fact they could not see all of their victims did not
somehow negate their express malice or intent to kill as to those victims who were
present and in harm’s way, but fortuitously were not killed.”  (Id. at pp. 563-564;
see also People v. Gaither (1959) 173 Cal.App.2d 662, 666-667 [defendant mailed
poisoned candy to his wife; convictions for administering poison with intent to kill
affirmed as to others who lived at the residence even if not a primary target].)
This case permits––virtually compels––a similar inference.  Even if the jury
found that defendant primarily wanted to kill Wilson rather than Wilson’s
passengers, it could reasonably also have found a concurrent intent to kill those
passengers when defendant and his cohort fired a flurry of bullets at the fleeing car
21
and thereby created a kill zone.  Such a finding fully supports attempted murder
convictions as to the passengers.6
The Attorney General argues that not applying transferred intent here
would create an anomaly.  He notes that, under Scott, supra, 14 Cal.4th 544, a
defendant who shoots at two persons and misses the intended target but kills an
unintended victim may be guilty of murder and attempted murder.  It would be
anomalous, he urges, to conclude that a person who instead kills the intended
target is guilty only of murder and, at most, assault as to the unintended victim.
“Paradoxically,” he argues, this result would “reward the defendant with good aim
and punish the one with bad aim, despite the fact that in both scenarios the
defendant acted with the exact same mental state:  the intent to kill his intended
victim, and his actions resulted in the same harm.”  We disagree that any anomaly
exists.  When one attempts to kill one person but instead kills another, there are
always two victims:  the intended target and the one actually killed.  But when one
kills the intended target, the situation may be different.  One victim—the dead
intended target—clearly exists, but whether a second victim also exists may be
less clear.  As discussed above, the defendant may be convicted of the attempted
murders of any within the kill zone, although on a concurrent, not transferred,
intent theory.  Persons not within the kill zone are not necessarily victims in the
same sense as the intended target of a shooting that kills the wrong person.
Convicting the defendant of a crime other than attempted murder, or no crime at
                                                
6 
This concurrent intent theory is not a legal doctrine requiring special jury
instructions such as is the doctrine of transferred intent.  Rather, it is simply a
reasonable inference the jury may draw in a given case:  a primary intent to kill a
specific target does not rule out a concurrent intent to kill others.
22
all, as to unintended targets who are neither killed nor within the kill zone creates
no anomaly.
For these reasons, we conclude that the doctrine of transferred intent does
not apply to attempted murder.  Defendant’s guilt of attempted murder must be
judged separately as to each alleged victim.7
3.  The Law Applied to this Case
In this case, defendant’s intent to kill Wilson does not transfer to Morgan or
Simon.  This is so, not because defendant killed his intended target, but because
transferred intent does not apply to attempted murder.  Whether defendant is guilty
of attempted premeditated murder of Morgan or Simon depends on his mental
state as to them, not on his mental state as to Wilson.  We must now decide
whether the court correctly instructed the jury on this law.  “Once we have
ascertained the relevant law, we determine the meaning of the instructions in this
regard.  Here the question is whether there is a ‘reasonable likelihood’ that the jury
understood the charge as the defendant asserts.”  (People v. Kelly (1992) 1 Cal.4th
495, 525.)
The majority below reversed the attempted murder convictions.  It
concluded that the trial court, “by referring to the instruction on transferred intent
in its reply [to the jury question], led the jury to believe that a finding of
premeditation as to the killing of Wilson could be transferred to the wounding of
Morgan and Simon.”  Justice Ortega dissented.  He noted that CALJIC No. 8.65
says only that when a person attempts to kill one person, “but by mistake or
                                                
7 
We express no opinion regarding the application of transferred intent to a
crime, such as battery, that is not inchoate and does not involve a homicide.  (See,
e.g., State v. Stringfield (Kan.Ct.App. 1980) 608 P.2d 1041 [transferred intent
applies to aggravated battery].)
23
inadvertence kills a different person,” the crime is the same as if the intended
target had been killed.  (Italics added.)  He argued that this instruction “could not
have been applied by the jury to transfer intent from Wilson to either Morgan or
Simon.”  Rather its language transferred intent only to a person actually killed.
“The instruction,” he argued, “is not one the jury would have had any trouble
understanding.  It is short, to the point, and uses simple words.  I find no
possibility the jury could have misapplied the instruction to nonfatal injuries.  The
instruction uses the words ‘kill,’ ‘kills,’ and ‘killed,’ and says nothing about
injuries.”  Justice Ortega also argued that, given the strength of the evidence, a
jury could not “rationally conclude that defendant did not intend to kill everyone
in the car.  He was at point-blank range firing at and hitting helpless people.  He
could not, while using such lethal force, have intended to merely ‘wing’ them or
otherwise inflict some sort of nonfatal injury.”  We agree with the dissent.
CALJIC No. 8.65, as the court gave it, refers to a mistaken killing, but not
to injuries.  Although labeled the “transferred intent” instruction, it does not
actually use that term.  It merely tells the jury, correctly, that if the defendant
killed the wrong person, the killing constituted the same crime as if the intended
person had been killed.  It directly related to this case and properly informed the
jury it did not have to determine who, exactly, defendant intended to kill in order
to find him guilty of murder.  But it did not go further.  It did not allow the jury to
transfer intent to someone who is only injured.
In Czahara, supra, 203 Cal.App.3d at page 1472, which found prejudicial
instructional error, the trial court modified CALJIC No. 8.65, and told the jury:
“When one attempts to kill a certain person, but by mistake or inadvertence injures
a different person, the crime, if any, so committed is the same as though the person
originally intended to be killed had been injured.”  (Italics added to indicate
24
modification.)  Here, the court committed no such error.  It did not modify
CALJIC No. 8.65 to extend its coverage to a person merely injured.
The district attorney’s argument to the jury, unlike the later instruction, did
suggest the jury could transfer intent to the attempted murder counts.  But any
uncertainty in this regard was dispelled when, during deliberations, the jury
specifically asked whether its finding on premeditation as to Wilson would
“follow over” to the attempted murder charge as to Morgan.  The court responded,
again correctly, that the jury had to “make a determination specifically as to each
count, whether you find willful, malicious, premeditation, if you find those as to
each count.  You make a separate finding.  [¶]  . . . One does not necessarily lead
and follow to the other.  You have to look at each count separately.”  After
conferring with the parties, the court additionally referred the jury to the relevant
instructions, including CALJIC No. 8.65, and reiterated that “each count is
determined separately one from another.  So a finding on one does not necessarily
lead to a finding on another.”
The question the jury asked the court, and the foreperson’s statements,
showed the jury was conscientiously parsing the precise language of the
instructions which, in this case, did not transfer intent to a person merely injured.
No reason appears to believe this jury would have misread the instruction’s simple
language as saying what it did not say.  The court also correctly answered the
jury’s specific question on this point.  Accordingly, we see no reasonable
likelihood that the jury understood the charge as permitting it to transfer intent to
kill to a person merely injured.  Moreover, we agree with Justice Ortega that the
evidence here virtually compelled a finding that, even if defendant primarily
wanted to kill Wilson, he also, concurrently, intended to kill the others in the car.
At the least, he intended to create a kill zone.  Contrary to the dissent, we conclude
25
that giving instructions that correctly state the law relating to the case was not
prejudicial error.8
B.  Proximate Causation
Section 12022.53(d) enhances the sentence of anyone who, in the
commission of specified felonies including murder and attempted murder (Pen.
Code, § 12022.53, subd. (a)(1), (18)), “intentionally and personally discharged a
firearm and proximately caused great bodily injury, as defined in [Penal Code]
Section 12022.7, or death, to any person other than an accomplice . . . .”  The jury
found this enhancement true as to the murder and attempted murder charges.  The
trial court instructed the jury on these statutory elements, but it did not define the
term “proximately caused.” 9  Defendant argues that the trial court had a sua sponte
duty to define proximate causation for the jury, and that its failure to do so was
prejudicial.  The majority below agreed.  Noting that the “evidence was not clear
as to which of the two, defendant or his cohort, fired the shots that hit each of the
three victims,” it concluded that “without a proper definition of proximate cause,
the jury could have found the enhancement true without determining that a bullet
fired by defendant struck a victim.”  Justice Ortega dissented.
The Attorney General argues the trial court had no sua sponte duty to
define proximate causation.  We disagree.  The court instructed the jury in terms
                                                
8 
Although we find the jury did not misunderstand the instructions in this
case, in future cases involving both murder and attempted murder (or
manslaughter) charges, it might be better for the court specifically to clarify that
transferred intent does not apply to the attempt charges.
9 
The court instructed:  “If you find the defendant guilty of murder [or]
attempted murder . . . , you must determine whether the defendant intentionally
and personally discharged a firearm and proximately caused death, or great bodily
injury, as defined in Penal Code section 12022.7 [which the court defined earlier]
to Kenneth Wilson, Leon Simon and Skylar Morgan.”
26
of the statute, which is appropriate if the jury would have no difficulty
understanding the statute without guidance.  (People v. Estrada (1995) 11 Cal.4th
568, 574.)  A court has no sua sponte duty to define terms that are commonly
understood by those familiar with the English language, but it does have a duty to
define terms that have a technical meaning peculiar to the law.  (Ibid.; People v.
Mayfield (1997) 14 Cal.4th 668, 773.)  “[T]erms are held to require clarification
by the trial court when their statutory definition differs from the meaning that
might be ascribed to the same terms in common parlance.”  (People v. Estrada,
supra, 11 Cal.4th at pp. 574-575, citing People v. Richie (1994) 28 Cal.App.4th
1347, 1360.)
Even courts and the legal community have struggled with the meaning of
proximate causation.  “The misunderstanding engendered by the term ‘proximate
cause’ has been documented.”  (Mitchell v. Gonzalez (1991) 54 Cal.3d 1041,
1051.)  “It is reasonably likely that when jurors hear the term ‘proximate cause’
they may misunderstand its meaning . . . .”  (Id. at p. 1050.)  In Mitchell, we
disapproved the then-standard instruction on proximate causation in civil cases.
(Id. at pp. 1050-1054.)  We have since found that the earlier instruction’s
“infirmity is equally great in criminal cases.”  (People v. Roberts (1992) 2 Cal.4th
271, 313.)  CALJIC No. 3.40, the standard criminal law instruction on causation,
has since been modified to reflect these decisions.  (See People v. Temple (1993)
19 Cal.App.4th 1750, 1754-1756.)  These decisions make clear that proximate
causation does have a meaning peculiar to the law, and that a jury would have
difficulty understanding its meaning without guidance.  We thus conclude the
court erred in not defining proximate causation.
To determine whether the error was prejudicial we must decide what
instruction the court should have given.  CALJIC No. 17.19.5 (2002 rev.) (6th ed.
1996) is the current standard instruction regarding the section 12022.53(d)
27
enhancement, although it did not exist at the time of trial here.  It defines
proximate causation in terms substantially identical to CALJIC No. 3.40 but
adapted to the provisions of section 12022.53(d):  “A proximate cause of great
bodily injury or death is an act or omission that sets in motion a chain of events
that produces as a direct, natural and probable consequence of the act or omission
the great bodily injury or death and without which the great bodily injury or death
would not have occurred.”  (Brackets omitted.)  The Use Note to CALJIC No.
17.19.5, supra, states, “If there is more than one cause of the bodily injury or
death, CALJIC 3.41 should also be given.”  CALJIC No. 3.41, in turn, as adapted
to the provisions of section 12022.53(d), provides:  “There may be more than one
cause of the [great bodily injury or death].  When the conduct of two or more
persons contributes concurrently as a cause of the [great bodily injury or death],
the conduct of each is a cause of the [great bodily injury or death] if that conduct
was also a substantial factor contributing to the result.  A cause is concurrent if it
was operative at the moment of the [great bodily injury or death] and acted with
another cause to produce the [great bodily injury or death].  [¶]  [If you find that
the defendant’s conduct was a cause of [great bodily injury or death] to another
person, then it is no defense that the conduct of some other person [, even the
[injured] [deceased] person,] contributed to the [great bodily injury or death].]”
(Bracketed references to “great bodily injury or death” added to adapt the
instruction to § 12022.53(d); other brackets in original.)
The Court of Appeal found CALJIC No. 17.19.5 “is not a proper definition
of proximate cause.  That instruction would permit a true finding on the
enhancement based [on] the cohort’s inflicting the death and injuries and
defendant’s aiding and abetting him simply by also firing a gun.  The enhancement
cannot be found true unless defendant personally fired the bullets which struck the
victim.  We note that the Attorney General does not contend otherwise.”  The
28
Attorney General contends in this court that CALJIC No. 17.19.5 correctly states
the law.  He argues that “proximately caus[ing]” injury or death is different from
personally inflicting the injury or death, and that defendant could indeed
proximately cause injury or death even if his own bullets did not hit anyone.
Citing the Court of Appeal’s statement that “the Attorney General does not
contend otherwise” and California Rules of Court, rule 29(b),10 defendant claims
that the Attorney General is precluded from making this argument because he did
not make it in the Court of Appeal.  We disagree.  In the Court of Appeal,
defendant neither criticized CALJIC No. 17.19.5 nor argued that section
12022.53(d) requires the defendant to personally fire the bullets that inflict the
harm.  The Court of Appeal opinion interjected the point for the first time.
Therefore, until the opinion was filed, the Attorney General had no reason to argue
it either way.  An argument responsive only to a point the Court of Appeal raised
for the first time in its opinion is not an “issue that could have been . . . raised in
the briefs filed in the Court of Appeal” within the meaning of California Rules of
Court, rule 29(b).  The Attorney General is entitled to argue in this court that the
Court of Appeal’s legal conclusion is incorrect.
We believe that CALJIC No. 17.19.5 does correctly define proximate
causation.  Section 12022.53(d) requires that the defendant “intentionally and
personally discharged a firearm” (italics added), but only that he “proximately
caused” the great bodily injury or death.  The jury, properly instructed, reasonably
found that defendant did personally discharge a firearm.  The statute states nothing
                                                
10 
As relevant, that rule provides:  “As a matter of policy, on petition for
review the Supreme Court normally will not consider:  [¶]  (1)  any issue that
could have been but was not timely raised in the briefs filed in the Court of
Appeal.”  (Cal. Rules of Court, rule 29(b).)
29
else that defendant must personally do.  Proximately causing and personally
inflicting harm are two different things.  The Legislature is aware of the
difference.  When it wants to require personal infliction, it says so.  (E.g., Pen.
Code, § 12022.7, subd. (a) [imposing a sentence enhancement on a person who
“personally inflicts great bodily injury”].)  When it wants to require something
else, such as proximate causation, it says so, as in section 12022.53(d).
The Court of Appeal considered a similar question in People v. Rodriguez
(1999) 69 Cal.App.4th 341.  In Rodriguez, the prosecution alleged that a certain
prior conviction was a serious felony under Penal Code section 1192.7,
subdivision (c)(8), i.e., that it was a felony in which the defendant “personally
inflict[ed]” great bodily injury.  The prior conviction, however, was of a crime that
only required that the defendant’s actions “proximately cause[d]” death or serious
bodily injury.  (Pen. Code, § 148.10; see People v. Rodriguez, supra, at pp. 345-
346.)  The trial court instructed the jury in terms of proximate causation under
CALJIC No. 3.40, and the jury found the prior conviction was serious.  The Court
of Appeal reversed.  It concluded, “Proximately causing an injury is clearly
different from personally inflicting an injury.”  (People v. Rodriguez, supra, at p.
351.)  “To ‘personally inflict’ an injury is to directly cause an injury, not just to
proximately cause it.  The instruction was wrong because it allowed the jury to
find against Rodriguez if the . . . injury was a ‘direct, natural and probable
consequence’ of Rodriguez’s action, even if Rodriguez did not personally inflict
the injury.”  (Id. at pp. 347-348.)
The Rodriguez court discussed People v. Cole (1982) 31 Cal.3d 568, which
construed Penal Code section 12022.7’s requirement that the defendant
“personally inflict[] great bodily injury.”  “Cole illustrates that the term
‘personally inflict’ has a distinct meaning and that its use in a statute signifies a
legislative intent to punish only the actor who directly inflicts an injury. . . .  We
30
think it obvious that an individual can and often does proximately cause injury
without personally inflicting that injury.  For instance, as noted in Cole, an aider
and abettor of a crime can commit a direct act—affirmatively blocking a victim’s
exit—which proximately causes injury, but does not constitute personal infliction
of an injury.  (Cole, supra, 31 Cal.3d at p. 571.)”  (People v. Rodriguez, supra, 69
Cal.App.4th at pp. 348-349, italics added.)  The court contrasted the term
“personally inflicts” with the language the Legislature used in section
12022.53(d).  “ ‘ “It is a well recognized principle of statutory construction that
when the Legislature has carefully employed a term in one place and has excluded
it in another, it should not be implied where excluded.” ’  [Citation.]  To illustrate,
the Legislature included ‘proximate cause’ in [Penal Code] section 12022.53 . . . .
However, the Legislature did not employ the proximate cause concept when it
articulated the requirements for enhancement under [Penal Code] section 12022.7,
but instead used the language ‘personally inflicts great bodily injury.’  ([Pen.
Code,] § 12022.7, subd. (a).) . . . .  We decline to impute the proximate cause
concept into the statute when the Legislature left it out.”  (People v. Rodriguez,
supra, at pp. 349-350.)
The Court of Appeal here erred in the reverse way.  It imputed the personal
infliction “concept into a statute when the Legislature left it out.”  (People v.
Rodriguez, supra, 69 Cal.App.4th at p. 350.)  A person can proximately cause a
gunshot injury without personally firing the weapon that discharged the harm-
inflicting bullet.  For example, in People v. Sanchez, supra, 26 Cal.4th 834, two
persons engaged in a gun battle, killing an innocent bystander.  Who fired the fatal
bullet, and thus who personally inflicted the harm, was unknown, but we held that
the jury could find that both gunmen proximately caused the death.  (Id. at pp.
848-849.)  The same is true here.  If defendant did not fire the bullets that hit the
victims, he did not personally inflict, but he may have proximately caused, the
31
harm.  CALJIC Nos. 3.40 and 3.41, and hence 17.19.5, correctly define proximate
causation.  (People v. Sanchez, supra, 26 Cal.4th at p. 845; People v. Cervantes,
supra, 26 Cal.4th at pp. 866-867.)  Accordingly, the trial court should have given
an instruction like CALJIC No. 3.40 and, because the evidence suggested more
than one cause, No. 3.41 (today CALJIC No. 17.19.5, augmented, when the
evidence suggests more than one cause, by CALJIC No. 3.41).
We also conclude, however, that the error was harmless under any standard.
The majority below reversed the enhancement findings because the jury might
have found the enhancement true without finding that defendant fired a bullet that
struck a victim.  However, as we have seen, section 12022.53(d) does not require
that the defendant fire a bullet that directly inflicts the harm.  The enhancement
applies so long as defendant’s personal discharge of a firearm was a proximate,
i.e., a substantial, factor contributing to the result.
As noted above, we stated in Mitchell v. Gonzalez, supra, 54 Cal.3d at page
1050, that jurors hearing the term “proximate cause” may “misunderstand its
meaning . . . .”  To complete what we said there, jurors “may misunderstand its
meaning or improperly limit their discussion of what constitutes a cause in fact.”
(Ibid., italics added.)  However, jurors who improperly limit their discussion of
what constitutes proximate cause will not find causation where it does not exist.
The correct definition of proximate causation is broader, not narrower, than jurors
might assume.  In a criminal case, we noted that “in Mitchell we criticized the
[former proximate cause instruction] as placing undue emphasis on physical or
temporal nearness.  [Citation.]  Thus, . . . any such confusion on the jury’s part
could only benefit defendant.”  (People v. Roberts, supra, 2 Cal.4th at p. 313; see
also People v. Catlin (2001) 26 Cal.4th 81, 157 [citing this language with
approval].)  On the facts of this case, the jury could not have misunderstood the
32
term “proximate cause” in a way that would have prejudiced defendant, i.e., that
would have resulted in a finding of proximate causation on an improper basis.
In arguing to the contrary, the dissent contends the jury may have found
that the cohort fired his gun first and inflicted the injuries.  Assuming that the
evidence supported such findings and that those circumstances would prevent a
true finding on the enhancement (cf. In re Sergio R. (1991) 228 Cal.App.3d 588,
601-602), we still see no prejudice.  Even if the jurors did not know exactly what
proximate causation means, no juror who is conversant in the English language
would find that discharging a firearm proximately caused injuries that had already
occurred.
III.  CONCLUSION
We reverse the judgment of the Court of Appeal and remand the matter for
further proceedings consistent with this opinion.
CHIN, J.
WE CONCUR:
GEORGE, C.J.
BAXTER, J.
WERDEGAR, J.
BROWN, J.
1
DISSENTING OPINION BY KENNARD, J.
Unlike the majority, I am of the view that the trial court’s failure to
properly instruct the jury on the scope of the transferred intent doctrine prejudiced
defendant.  Nor do I agree that the trial court’s failure to define the term
“proximate cause” in connection with the sentence enhancement for “proximately”
causing great bodily injury or death was harmless error.
I
Skylar Morgan and Leon Simon, neither of whom was a gang member,
testified that on the night of March 6, 1999, they were in Long Beach in a car
driven by Kenneth “Kebo” Wilson, a member of the Rolling 20’s Crips street
gang.  Wilson stopped the car to talk to defendant and another man, both members
of the Insane Crips, a rival gang.  When defendant asked Wilson if he was “Kebo,”
Wilson replied he was, adding that his passengers were not gang members.  He
said he would drop off his passengers and return.  Saying, “So you Kebo from
20’s,” defendant opened fire.  As Wilson started to drive away, defendant and his
companion fired at the car.  Wilson was killed; his passengers, Morgan and Simon,
were wounded.
According to Morgan and Simon, it was defendant who started shooting.  In
a tape-recorded statement to the police that was played to the jury, defendant said
his companion, Patrick LeBeau, fired the first shots, after which defendant “just
2
started shooting, too” because LeBeau was his “home boy.”  The evidence does
not show who fired the shots that hit Wilson, Morgan, and Simon.
Long Beach Police Officer Paul Edwards found a loaded gun on the floor
of Wilson’s car between the driver’s seat and the door.  The gun was inoperable.
A jury convicted defendant of the murder of Wilson and the attempted
murders of Morgan and Simon.  As to each count the jury found true a sentence
enhancement allegation that defendant had fired a gun and “proximately” caused
great bodily injury or death.  (Pen. Code, § 12022.53, subd. (d).)
The Court of Appeal reversed the attempted murder convictions, based on
its conclusion that the trial court had misinstructed the jury on transferred intent.
It also reversed the sentence enhancement findings because of the trial court’s
failure to define proximate causation, an element of the enhancement.
II
In his closing statement, the prosecutor argued that defendant fired at the
victims’ car with a premeditated intent to kill passengers Morgan and Simon, but
he also argued that even if defendant intended to kill only driver Wilson, the jury
could, by applying the doctrine of transferred intent, convict defendant of
attempting to kill Morgan and Simon.  In his words, “the intent . . . follows the
bullet; wherever you are pointing it, that’s where it goes.”
When defense counsel argued there was no evidence that defendant
intended to kill Morgan and Simon, the prosecutor told the jury in rebuttal:
“[O]ne of the instructions talks about that, it is the concept of transfer [sic] intent.
You don’t get a benefit if you try to kill one person and inadvertently kill another,
that that was not your intent.  An attempt follows the bullets, kills a different
person, the crime so committed is the same as though you originally had given that
intended target.  The law does not excuse bad marksmanship or hitting other
people.  [Defendant] is responsible for each of those acts.”
3
After closing argument, the prosecutor asked the trial court to give the jury
CALJIC No. 8.65, the standard instruction on transferred intent.  He gave this
reason:  “[T]he argument of the defense was basically he didn’t necessarily intend
to shoot the other people [Morgan and Simon].  And I felt it necessary to respond
to that with transfer [sic] intent.”  The trial court then instructed the jury, “When
one attempts to kill a certain person, but by mistake or inadvertence kills a
different person, the crime, if any, so committed is the same as though the person
originally intended to be killed, had been killed.”
During deliberations, the jury asked the trial court whether a finding of
premeditation as to the murder of Wilson would “follow over” to the attempted
murder of Morgan.  The court responded that the jury had to make a separate
determination whether, as to each count, defendant’s acts were willful, malicious,
and premeditated.  The prosecutor then asked the trial court to direct the jury to
consider CALJIC Nos. 8.65 (transferred intent), 8.66 (defining attempted murder)
and 8.67 (defining attempted premeditated murder).  The court did so, telling the
jury:  “I will refer you to three jury instructions that may assist you in reaching a
determination.  One is 8.65, the other is 8.66, and the third is 8.67. . . .  If you wish
to take a look at those, it may be helpful.  [¶]  With respect to each count, each
count is determined separately from one another.  So a finding on one does not
necessarily lead to a finding on another.  It may assist.”
The majority correctly holds that the doctrine of transferred intent does not
apply to a charge of attempted murder.  Thus, if defendant here had acted with a
premeditated intent to kill Wilson, but as to Morgan and Simon lacked
premeditation or intent to kill, he could not be convicted of the charges of
attempted premeditated murder.  Nevertheless, the majority concludes that the trial
court did not err in giving CALJIC No. 8.65, the instruction on transferred intent.
The majority reasons that the instruction discussed only what the jury should do if
4
it were to find that in trying to kill one person, the defendant killed another.  This
leads the majority to conclude that the jury must have assumed that the instruction
pertained only to the charge that defendant murdered Wilson, a crime to which the
transferred intent doctrine applies,1 and that the jury did not apply the instruction
to the charges of attempted murder because victims Morgan and Simon were not
killed.
The majority’s reasoning is unsound for three reasons.
First, the prosecutor believed that CALJIC No. 8.65, the instruction on
transferred intent, applied not only to murder but also to attempted murder:  He
specifically asked the trial court to give the instruction to counter the defense
argument that defendant should not be convicted of attempted murder because he
lacked the intent to kill Morgan and Simon.  If the prosecutor, a professional
trained and experienced in criminal law, incorrectly believed that the instruction
applied to attempted murder, it is difficult to fathom the majority’s conclusion that
a jury of lay individuals would correctly apply to the facts in this case the complex
legal principles contained in the instruction on transferred intent.
Second, although the majority is right that the instruction on transferred
intent applies to a charge of murder, here the facts did not warrant applying the
instruction to the murder of Wilson.  To apply the instruction to the Wilson
murder, the jury would have had to believe that defendant intended to kill Morgan
and Simon, who were wounded, but that he did not intend to kill Wilson, who died
from gunshot wounds.  The evidence, however, was just the opposite, suggesting
                                                
1 
English courts have applied the transferred intent doctrine to murder for
over four centuries.  (See The Queen v. Saunders & Archer (1576) 75 Eng.Rep.
706, 708.)  For almost a century, this court has consistently held that the doctrine
applies to California’s murder statute.  (See People v. Scott (1996) 14 Cal.4th 544,
549-550; People v. Suesser (1904) 142 Cal. 354, 366.)
5
that defendant wanted to kill Wilson, a member of a rival gang, but not Morgan
and Simon, who did not belong to any gang.
Third, in closing argument the prosecutor did not ask the jury to apply the
instruction on transferred intent to the charge of murder of Wilson.  Instead, he
argued that it applied to the two counts of attempted murder when responding to
the defense argument that defendant was not guilty of those charges because he
did not intend to kill Wilson’s two passengers, Morgan and Simon.
That the jury must have applied the doctrine of transferred intent to the
charges of attempted murder follows from its question to the trial court, during
deliberations, whether a finding of premeditation as to the murdered Wilson would
“follow over” to the wounded Morgan.  One can reasonably conclude that the jury
did not inquire about defendant’s intent to kill Wilson, because it believed it
already knew the answer:  that under CALJIC No. 8.65, it could transfer that intent
to Morgan and Simon, the two alleged victims of attempted murder.
The trial court’s directive to the jury to reread CALJIC No. 8.65, the
instruction on transferred intent, must have reinforced, albeit erroneously so, the
jury’s belief that it should apply that instruction to the charges of attempted
murder, as the prosecutor, in closing argument, had asked the jury to do.
The trial court’s instruction on the doctrine of transferred intent was
ambiguous.  Not at all clear was whether it applied only to the charge of murder of
Wilson, or whether it also applied to the attempted murder charges pertaining to
the injured Morgan and Simon.  When a trial court’s instructions are ambiguous, a
reviewing court must determine whether there is “a reasonable likelihood that the
jury misconstrued or misapplied the words” of the instruction.  (People v. Clair
(1992) 2 Cal.4th 629, 663.)  In this case, for the reasons given above, it is a virtual
certainty that the jury misapplied CALJIC No. 8.65, the instruction on transferred
intent, to the charges of attempted murder.
6
The majority cursorily concludes that any instructional error was harmless
because “the evidence here virtually compelled a finding that, even if defendant
primarily wanted to kill Wilson, he also, concurrently, intended to kill the others in
the car” because he “intended to create a kill zone.”  (Maj. opn., ante, at p. 24)
Not so.  Defendant had a motive to kill Wilson because he knew the latter to be a
member of a rival gang, but Wilson’s two passengers, Morgan and Simon, were
not gang members and Wilson said so to defendant; the prosecution offered no
evidence that defendant had any motive to kill the two passengers.  Although the
jury certainly could have concluded that defendant intended to kill all of the
occupants in the car, I cannot say “beyond a reasonable doubt” (Chapman v.
California (1967) 386 U.S. 18, 24) that the jury would necessarily have reached
such a conclusion.
III
Subdivision (d) of Penal Code section 12022.53 provides that any
defendant who, in the commission of specified felonies, “intentionally and
personally discharged a firearm and proximately caused great bodily injury . . . or
death, to any person other than an accomplice” (italics added) must be sentenced
to a term of 25 years to life in prison.  The trial court here instructed the jury on
this sentence enhancement but did not define the term “proximately” for the jury.
I disagree with the majority that the trial court’s failure to do so was harmless
error.
In support of its conclusion, the majority quotes this statement by a
majority of this court in Mitchell v. Gonzales (1991) 54 Cal.3d 1041, 1050:  “It is
reasonably likely that when jurors hear the term ‘proximate cause’ they may
misunderstand its meaning or improperly limit their discussion of what constitutes
7
a cause in fact.” 2  Seizing on the last half of this statement, the majority observes
that if the trial court’s failure to define proximate cause caused the jury to
“improperly limit” (Mitchell, at p. 1050) the scope of proximate cause, defendant
could not have been injured.  The majority explains:  “[J]urors who improperly
limit their discussion of what constitutes proximate cause will not find causation
where it does not exist.  The correct definition of proximate causation is broader,
not narrower, than jurors might assume.”  (Maj. opn., ante, at p. 31.)  I agree with
the majority that if the jury thought proximate cause had a more limited meaning
than the correct definition of that term, the trial court’s failure to define it did not
prejudice defendant.  But, as I shall explain, that is not the only way in which the
jury may have misconstrued the meaning of proximate cause.
In Mitchell, this court described an experiment, conducted as part of “a
scholarly study of 14 jury instructions,” in which “ ‘the term “proximate cause”
was misunderstood by 23% of the subjects,’ ” who thought it meant
“ ‘ “approximate cause,” “estimated cause,” or some fabrication.’ ”  (Mitchell v.
Gonzales, supra, 54 Cal.3d at p. 1051.)  The words “approximate” and
“estimated” both imply a level of certainty that is less than the “beyond a
reasonable doubt” standard required in criminal cases.  Like the subjects in the just
described experiment, the jury here may have similarly misunderstood the word
“proximately.”
CALJIC No. 17.19.5 (2002 rev.) (6th ed. 1996) correctly defines a
proximate cause of great bodily injury or death as “an act or omission that sets in
                                                
2 
In Mitchell, I disagreed with the majority’s disapproval of BAJI No. 3.75, a
standard jury instruction defining proximate cause.  (See Mitchell v. Gonzales,
supra, 54 Cal.3d at pp. 1056-1062 (dis. opn. of Kennard, J.).)  The majority’s
observation there that jurors are likely to misunderstand the term “proximate
cause” unless its meaning is defined for them was not a point of disagreement.
8
motion a chain of events that produces as a direct, natural and probable
consequence of the act or omission the great bodily injury or death and without
which the great bodily injury or death would not have occurred.”  That is how the
trial court in this case should have instructed the jury.  If the jury had been so
instructed, could it have had a reasonable doubt as to whether defendant
“proximately” caused not only Wilson’s death but also the injuries to Morgan and
Simon?  The answer is “yes.”
If defendant did fire the bullets that struck the three victims, it necessarily
follows that he “proximately caused great bodily injury . . . or death.”  (Pen. Code,
§ 12022.53, subd. (d).)  But both defendant and his companion fired shots, and the
evidence does not show whose shots caused the injuries.  Thus, the jury could not
have found beyond a reasonable doubt that defendant shot the three victims.  Even
if defendant’s accomplice was the one who shot them, defendant proximately
caused their injuries if he “set[] in motion a chain of events” that as a “direct,
natural and probable consequence,” led to the shooting.  (CALJIC No. 17.19.5.)
That scenario would have required defendant to shoot first, with his accomplice
following suit.  It is not at all clear, however, who fired first.  Morton and Simon
testified it was defendant.  But defendant, in a tape-recorded statement to the
police that was played at trial, claimed it was his companion who began the
shooting and defendant then joined him in support.  Under this scenario, if the
accomplice’s bullets rather than defendant’s struck the three victims, defendant
did not proximately cause their injuries, because the accomplice started shooting
on his own initiative, not in response to an act by defendant.
Because of these conflicting accounts, the jury may have been uncertain
who fired first and whose shots hit Wilson, Morton, and Simon.  Given that
uncertainty, the jury, had it been properly instructed on the meaning of proximate
cause, might well have decided that it could not find beyond a reasonable doubt
9
that defendant proximately caused great bodily injury or death to the three victims.
Thus, the trial court’s failure to define that term was prejudicial error.  (See
Chapman v. California, supra, 386 U.S. 18, 24.)
IV
For the reasons given above, I would affirm the judgment of the Court of
Appeal, which reversed defendant’s convictions for attempting to murder Morgan
and Simon and also reversed the sentence enhancements for use of a firearm that
proximately caused the death of Wilson as well as the injuries to Morgan and
Simon.
KENNARD, J.
I CONCUR:
MORENO, J.
1
See next page for addresses and telephone numbers for counsel who argued in Supreme Court.
Name of Opinion People v. Bland
__________________________________________________________________________________
Unpublished Opinion XXX NP opn. filed 3/27/01 – 2d Dist., Div. 1
Original Appeal
Original Proceeding
Review Granted
Rehearing Granted
__________________________________________________________________________________
Opinion No. S097340
Date Filed: July 1, 2002
__________________________________________________________________________________
Court: Superior
County: Los Angeles
Judge: Bradford L. Andrews
__________________________________________________________________________________
Attorneys for Appellant:
Mark L. Christiansen, under appointment by the Supreme Court, for Defendant and Appellant.
__________________________________________________________________________________
Attorneys for  Respondent:
Bill Lockyer, Attorney General, Carol Wendelin Pollack, David P. Druliner and Robert R. Anderson, Chief
Assistant Attorneys General, Marc E. Turchin, Acting Assistant Attorney General, Pamela C. Hamanaka,
Assistant Attorney General, John R. Gorey and Noah P. Hill, Deputy Attorneys General, for Plaintiff and
Respondent.
2
Counsel who argued in Supreme Court (not intended for publication with opinion):
Mark L. Christiansen
44489 Town Center Way
Palm Desert, CA  92260
(916) 652-0682
Noah P. Hill
Deputy Attorney General
300 South Spring Street
Los Angeles, CA  90013
(213) 897-8884