Title: P. v. Leonard

State: california

Issuer: California Supreme Court

Document:

1
Filed 5/17/07 
 
 
 
IN THE SUPREME COURT OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 
 
THE PEOPLE, 
) 
 
 
) 
 
Plaintiff and Respondent, 
) 
 
 
) 
S054291 
 
v. 
) 
 
 
) 
  
ERIC ROYCE LEONARD, 
) 
 
 
) 
Sacramento County 
 
Defendant and Appellant. 
) 
Super. Ct. No. CR111002 
___________________________________ ) 
 
A jury convicted defendant Eric Royce Leonard of six counts of murder 
(Pen. Code, § 187),1 and it found true two special-circumstance allegations of 
robbery murder (§ 190.2, subd. (a)(17)) as well as one special-circumstance 
allegation of multiple murder (§ 190.2, subd. (a)(3)).  The jury also convicted 
defendant of two counts of robbery (§ 211), and it found that he had personally 
used a dangerous or deadly weapon in the commission of each offense (§ 12022.5, 
subd. (a)).  At the penalty phase, the jury returned a verdict of death.  Defendant’s 
appeal to this court is automatic.  (§ 1239, subd. (b).)  We affirm the judgment in 
its entirety. 
                                              
1  
Unless otherwise stated, all further statutory references are to the Penal 
Code. 
 2
I.  FACTS 
A.  Guilt Phase – Prosecution’s Case 
At 11:30 p.m. on the night of February 12, 1991, California Highway Patrol 
Officers James Young and Barry Hoover went to a Quik Stop convenience store 
on Auburn Boulevard in Sacramento.  Young bought a pack of gum and spoke for 
a few minutes to the clerk, Zeid Obeid.  At roughly the same time, Sallie Jane 
Thomas drove her fiancé, Stephen Anderson, to his new job as a clerk at Quik 
Stop.  She saw a young White male wearing a black trench coat, black slacks, and 
black shoes, walking down the street about a block from the store.  Thomas 
dropped Anderson off at Quik Stop and returned home.   
About 15 minutes thereafter, Lester Morris arrived at Quik Stop and saw a 
man lying on the pavement in the parking lot, near the front door of the store, with 
blood on his stomach.  Morris felt the man’s pulse, realized he was still alive, and 
ran into the store seeking help.  There he found two men lying on the floor in 
pools of blood.  Morris, who was deaf and had impaired speech, tried to call 911 
from a pay phone but he could not make himself understood.  A pickup truck 
pulled into the parking lot soon after, and the driver, Joshua Reed, made the call 
for him.   
Highway Patrol Officers Young and Hoover, summoned back to the scene, 
found store clerks Anderson and Obeid lying near two open cash registers.  
Anderson was dead.  Obeid, who was unconscious, was taken to the hospital, as 
was the man found lying outside the store, who was identified as Thor Johnson.  
Both men later died without regaining consciousness.  Anderson and Obeid had 
each been shot twice in the head, once from more than 18 inches away and once at 
very close range (less than two inches).  Johnson had been shot once in the back of 
the head at a distance of greater than 18 inches.   
 3
Sacramento County Sheriff’s deputies found three expended shell casings 
inside the Quik Stop store.  A fourth casing was found just outside the store, and a 
store employee later found a fifth casing inside the store.  Five bullets were 
recovered from the bodies of the victims.  Both the shell casings and the bullets 
were .25-caliber ammunition.  The currency had been removed from both of the 
store’s cash registers, leaving only food stamps and coins.  The deputies found a 
box of shredded beef jerky, several lids to plastic jerky containers, and a bottle of 
grapefruit juice on top of an ice cream cabinet inside the store; they also found 
additional beef jerky containers as well as several pieces of jerky on the pavement 
outside the rear of the store.   
At 9:00 p.m. on February 19, 1991, one week after the Quik Stop murders, 
John Connolly ordered and paid for a small pizza from the Round Table Pizza 
restaurant at the Country Club Center in Sacramento, six blocks from the Quik 
Stop store.  He then went to the Glacier Lounge, a nearby bar, planning to pick up 
the pizza later.  At 10:50 that night, Alexander Ting, a 17-year-old high school 
student, rode his bicycle to a market at the Country Club Center.  After parking his 
bicycle, he walked in front of the Round Table Pizza restaurant, where he saw a 
man in a dark trench coat standing at the front counter.  Ting bought a soda and 
ice cream at the market and returned to his bicycle about 10 minutes later.  The 
man in the trench coat was standing on the sidewalk in front of the restaurant, 
looking from side to side.   
At 11:08 p.m., John Connolly returned to the Round Table Pizza restaurant 
for his pizza.  He found the door open and the restaurant apparently empty.  
Connolly called out that he had returned for his pizza.  When nobody answered, 
Connolly (a regular customer) took his pizza from the oven and left.   
At approximately 11:00 p.m. that same night, Andrew Keogh, the assistant 
manager of another Round Table Pizza restaurant, telephoned the Round Table 
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Pizza restaurant at the Country Club Center.  When no one answered, he asked 
employee Renee Bennett to make several additional calls between 11:05 and 
11:20.  When there was still no answer, Keogh asked Bennett to drive to the 
restaurant at the Country Club Center to make sure everything was all right.  
When Bennett arrived there, the door was open, although the restaurant should 
have closed at 11 o’clock.  In the scullery, she found the three restaurant 
employees lying motionless on the floor in pools of what appeared to be blood.  
She called Keogh.  He drove over to the restaurant and immediately called 911.   
Sheriff’s deputies and paramedics arrived within minutes.  They determined 
that two of the employees – Sarah Crook and Kyle Reynolds – were dead.  The 
third employee, Andrea Coladangelo, was taken to a hospital, where she died 
without regaining consciousness.  Each victim had been repeatedly shot in the 
head – Crook twice; Reynolds and Coladangelo three times each.  Two of the 
restaurant’s three cash registers had been emptied.  Eight cartridge casings and 
five expended bullets were found at the scene, and two others were retrieved from 
the victims’ bodies.  All were .25-caliber ammunition.   
The Sacramento County Sherriff’s Department mounted a massive manhunt 
for the killer, interviewing hundreds of people.  One of the persons they spoke to 
was defendant, who lived near the two crime scenes.  He was interviewed at the 
sheriff’s department after he was spotted, two days after the Round Table killings, 
walking down a street not far from the Quik Stop store at night and wearing a 
trench coat.  Defendant told Sheriff’s Deputy Robert Bell that he had been at Quik 
Stop on the night the murders were committed there, but he did not arrive until 
after the sheriff’s barricades were set up.  He also said he went to the Country 
Club shopping center early on the evening of the Round Table murders, but did 
not enter the restaurant.  Because defendant was quiet, timid, frightened, and 
confused, and he appeared to be mentally disabled as a result of epilepsy, Bell 
 5
wrote in his report that defendant was not a likely suspect.  Bell did, however, take 
defendant’s photograph.   
In May 1991, three months after the murders, Sheriff’s deputies, still 
searching for the killer, interviewed Charlotte Henstra and Shane Whitcomb.  
Henstra worked at a small grocery one block from the Quik Stop store.  She said 
that on the night of the Quik Stop murders, a young man in a trench coat and black 
dress shoes with tassels had come into her store and stayed for approximately 45 
minutes, leaving at about 10 p.m.  That same night, between 9:45 and 10 o’clock, 
Whitcomb, who worked at an office complex near the Quik Stop, saw a man in a 
trench coat and Italian loafers with tassels, who appeared to have come through a 
hole in a fence next to the office’s parking lot.  When Whitcomb asked the man 
for a cigarette lighter, the man made a strange grunting noise and kept walking.   
On June 4, 1991, with the investigation at a standstill, Sheriff’s Detective 
Stanley Reed learned of Deputy Bell’s February 1991 interview with defendant.  
Reed and Lieutenant Raymond Biondi found the photograph Bell had taken of 
defendant and showed it to Charlotte Henstra and Shane Whitcomb.  Both said 
that defendant looked like the person they had seen the night of the Quik Stop 
murders.  Reed and Biondi then showed the photograph to the manager of Zeke’s, 
a gun store located near the two crime scenes, who said he had seen defendant in 
the store.  The next day, Reed and Biondi showed a photographic lineup 
containing defendant’s picture to Sallie Thomas, who had seen a man in a trench 
coat walking near Quik Stop when she had driven her fiancé to work there less 
than half an hour before the killings.  She picked out defendant’s photograph as 
being the “most familiar.”  They showed the same lineup to Alex Ting, who had 
seen a man in a trench coat outside the Round Table Pizza restaurant on the night 
the killings occurred there.  He picked out defendant’s photograph as “a 
possibility.”   
 6
On June 6, 1991, Lieutenant Biondi and Detective Reed conducted a 
videotaped interviewed with defendant at the sheriff’s department.  During the 
interview, which is described in greater detail in part III. B., post, defendant 
admitted that he had bought ammunition from Zeke’s.  He also telephoned his 
father, Douglas Leonard, telling him he had put some of that ammunition into his 
father’s ammunition box.  He also said that his father’s gun used the same kind of 
bullets as the gun used to commit the murders.  After the interview, Biondi and 
Reed took defendant back to his apartment.  There, defendant gave them an 
ammunition box and a baggie that between them contained 36 .25-caliber 
cartridges.  With defendant’s permission, Biondi and Reed also took a trench coat 
and two pairs of shoes, one of which was a pair of dark dress shoes with tassels.   
Leaving defendant at his apartment, Lieutenant Biondi and Detective Reed 
then went to his father’s home and obtained his .25-caliber Beretta pistol and a 
box containing cartridges.  Ballistics tests conducted that afternoon determined 
that the pistol had fired the bullets and casings found in the victims’ bodies and at 
the crime scenes.  After learning this information, Biondi and Reed returned to the 
home of defendant’s father, where defendant had gone, and arrested him.  When 
Detective Reed told defendant’s father that his gun was the murder weapon, the 
father’s eyes teared up and he said:  “I know, he told me that he did it.  I can’t 
believe he did it.  I asked him why. . .  He said stress. . . .  I can’t believe he did it, 
he killed six people.”  (At trial, defendant’s father denied that defendant had 
confessed to him, and his statement to Detective Reed was admitted as a prior 
inconsistent statement.) 
Lieutenant Biondi and Detective Reed took defendant to the sheriff’s 
department and handcuffed him to a table in an interview room.  Defendant’s 
father came to the station and asked to speak to defendant.  Biondi and Reed 
permitted this, but they videotaped the conversation, which lasted 20 minutes.  
 7
The father repeatedly asked defendant whether anyone else was involved in the 
crimes, and defendant repeatedly said no one else was involved.   
In a lineup conducted after defendant’s arrest, Sallie Thomas identified 
defendant as the person she had seen walking near the Quik Stop store on the 
night of February 12, 1991, and Alexander Ting identified defendant as the person 
he had seen outside the Round Table restaurant on the night of February 19, 1991.  
(They also later identified him at trial.)  During a search of defendant’s apartment 
after his arrest, sheriff’s deputies seized a jar of beef jerky and an empty wooden 
crate with the word “jerky” printed on it.   
In September 1994, during pretrial proceedings on a motion for a change of 
venue, defendant raised his hand to speak and announced:  “I am guilty.”   
B.  Guilt Phase – Defense Case 
The defense argued that defendant was physically incapable of committing 
the murders because of severe mental and physical impairments that resulted from 
his uncontrolled epilepsy.   
Dr. Robert Pavy, a neurologist, explained at trial that defendant has 
epilepsy that affects both of his temporal lobes and that may have resulted from 
meningitis he suffered as a child.  He has frequent complex partial seizures that 
cannot be prevented by surgery or medication and that affect his personality.  Each 
seizure defendant experiences magnifies the damage to his brain.  He is unable to 
work or drive a car.   
According to Dr. Pavy, if defendant had a seizure shortly before his brief 
encounter with Shane Whitcomb, he could not have committed the robbery and 
the murders at the Quik Stop two hours later.  Pavy explained that the crimes 
required complex planning that defendant could not have performed until his 
brain’s recovery from the seizure, which would have taken several hours.  He said 
 8
that a man who suffers from complex partial seizures that are not controlled by 
medication would be incapable of going into a store, committing a robbery, and 
shooting three people in the head without missing, because such a robbery would 
cause the man to suffer anxiety, which in turn would bring on a seizure.   
Virginia Furlong, who worked at the California Department of 
Rehabilitation, testified that an intelligence quotient (IQ) test administered two 
years before the murders showed that defendant had a verbal IQ of 75, a 
performance IQ of 86, and a full-scale IQ of 78.  Dr. William Lynch, a 
neuropsychologist, testified that an IQ test conducted after defendant’s arrest 
showed his verbal IQ as 75, his performance IQ was 94, and his full-scale IQ was 
80.  Dr. Lynch explained that defendant’s full scale IQ placed him in the ninth 
percentile of the population, and that the wide disparity between his verbal IQ and 
his performance IQ indicated the presence of brain damage.  Based on other tests, 
Dr. Lynch concluded that defendant has “mild to moderate” brain damage.   
Dr. John Thornton, a forensic scientist, reviewed the reports of the crime 
scenes, but he concluded there was insufficient physical evidence to permit a 
detailed reconstruction of the crimes, including the order in which the victims 
were shot and the relative positions of the killer and the victims.  He testified that 
the gun used in the killings was not particularly accurate, and that the killer 
displayed remarkable accuracy because all of the shots hit the victims in the head 
and there was no evidence of misses or wild shots.  He said that if the killer had 
been wearing defendant’s trench coat, gloves, and shoes, he would have expected 
to find blood on those items, and none was found.   
Virl Dunn testified that defendant became a friend of his son Antoine in the 
sixth grade, and that defendant lived at Dunn’s house during his senior year in 
high school and the next year.  He said defendant had three to four epileptic 
seizures a week, and he described the seizures as well as the fatigue defendant 
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experienced in their wake.  He mentioned that defendant had continuous mild 
tremors (the defense theory was that this would have made it difficult for him to 
shoot accurately), and that defendant had difficulty planning and making quick 
decisions.  Agnes Dunn, Virl’s wife, corroborated his testimony.  Their son, 
Antoine Dunn, testified that he and defendant occasionally practiced target 
shooting with BB guns and a pellet rifle, and that once on a camping trip they took 
turns firing two guns owned by a friend.  He described defendant as a very poor 
marksman who was “[t]otally uncoordinated” and did not improve with practice.   
C.  Penalty Phase – Prosecution’s Case 
The prosecution called six witnesses to present victim impact evidence.  
They briefly outlined the life histories of the victims and described the devastating 
impact of the murders on the witnesses themselves and on other family members.   
Mark Hariri testified that his cousin, victim Zeid Obeid, emigrated from 
Kuwait.  He initially worked at Quik Stop but quit after the store was robbed.  
When he later decided to return to work there Hariri told him angrily over the 
telephone that he should not take the job because it was dangerous.  Hariri hung 
up after saying he hoped something bad would happen to Obeid.  When Obeid 
was murdered a few days later, Hariri experienced great guilt and underwent 
therapy.  The Kuwaiti government refused to allow Obeid’s body to be returned to 
Kuwait, where his parents lived, for burial because he was a Lebanese citizen, 
although he had spent most of his life in Kuwait.  After a delay of three months, 
his body was shipped to Lebanon, where he was buried.   
Aaron Johnson, the teenage son of victim Thor Johnson, testified that his 
father “was always there for us,” and expressed sadness that his father would be 
unable to see him graduate from high school or to attend the wedding of Aaron’s 
brother.   
 10
Sallie Thomas, Stephen Anderson’s fiancée, testified that she was four 
months pregnant with Anderson’s child when he was murdered.  Since the murder, 
she had been taking antidepressant medication.  She said Anderson’s family was 
devastated by his death.   
Kimberly Nabours, the sister of murder victim Sarah Crook, testified that 
Crook was a student at American River College in Sacramento at the time of her 
death.  Since Crook’s death, Nabours had begun to use drugs, and the loss 
“affected [her] mother to such a degree that she ultimately lost her house.”   
Donna Coladangelo, mother of murder victim Andrea Coladangelo, 
testified that Andrea had moved from Ohio to California to start a new life.  The 
family learned of Andrea’s death by a telephone call at 4:30 a.m., and four years 
later, she and her husband would still wake up every morning at that time.  
Andrea’s four brothers all had difficulty coping with her death, and Andrea’s 
father was afraid to be alone.   
Judith Reynolds, mother of victim Kyle Reynolds, testified that Kyle had 
just turned 20 when he was murdered and that he was attending Sierra Junior 
College.  She and her family were crushed by Kyle’s death, which left a “void . . . 
that nothing can fill.”   
D.  Penalty Phase – Defense Case 
The defense called various family members, teachers, psychologists and 
psychiatrists to present an extensive social and psychiatric history of defendant. 
Defendant’s father was an alcoholic who physically abused defendant’s 
mother, and the couple separated shortly after defendant’s birth.  Defendant had a 
seizure when he was eight months old, when he had a high fever and possibly 
meningitis, and he had another seizure, again brought on by a high fever, about 
four months later.  When he was four years old, he was diagnosed as epileptic 
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after having a third seizure that was not caused by fever.  He was treated with 
Dilantin, which controlled the seizures but left him “slowed down” mentally.  His 
second grade teacher believed he had a learning disability, and in fourth grade he 
was placed in a special education class.   
In the fifth grade, defendant’s doctor took him off Dilantin, which caused 
him to become more alert, but six months later his seizures returned.  He was 
prescribed several medications, which reduced the frequency of his seizures but 
did not prevent them from occurring.  At about this time, defendant’s mother 
became involved with Richard Bullock, a heavy drinker who disliked children.  
Defendant’s mother began drinking more heavily.  When she married Bullock, 
defendant went to live with his father, with whom he had little previous 
involvement.  Bullock and defendant’s mother moved to a small town in Missouri 
and bought a tavern.  After living with his father for two years, defendant called 
his mother and asked to live with her, saying his father beat him.   
Defendant joined his mother and stepfather in Missouri, where he lived for 
two years, but after the stepfather’s son moved out, defendant became lonely and 
returned to California, where he became very fat.  He first lived with his father and 
later with the Dunn family.  He graduated from high school in June of 1988.  The 
next year he moved into his own apartment.  In 1990, he enrolled in classes at a 
junior college and began losing weight rapidly.  In January of 1991 he was 
arrested for stealing a bathroom scale.  He pled guilty to this crime on February 
11, 1991, the day before committing the murders at Quik Stop.   
Julie Sidwell, a special education teacher at a junior college, first met 
defendant when he was 17 years old.  She helped him apply for supplemental 
security income (SSI) and subsidized housing.  She said that defendant, who was 
very immature, was determined to lead a normal life – to live on his own and go to 
college – but he did not understand that these goals were unrealistic because of his 
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disability.  He would study for hours but then have a seizure that caused him to 
forget everything he had learned.   
According to Carl Curtis, an expert in forensic accounting who examined 
defendant’s checkbook and checking account, defendant managed his money 
reasonably well from June 1988, when he graduated from high school and began 
receiving SSI checks, until the fall of 1989.  He then moved out of the Dunn 
family’s home and into a small apartment, which he could not afford on his SSI 
payments of $630 per month.  He exhausted his savings in January 1991, a month 
before the murders, and he began writing overdraft checks to meet his expenses.  
In February 1991, the month he committed the six murders, he spent $29.60 
(approximately a dollar a day) on food.   
Dr. Peter Valk, an expert in positron emission tomography (PET) scans, 
testified that he performed a PET scan of defendant’s brain, which showed a 
significant abnormality in the left temporal lobe and a lesser degree of impairment 
in the right lobe.  Dr. Bruce Reed, a neuropsychologist, agreed with Dr. Valk’s 
testimony.  Based on the PET scan and on defendant’s medical history, Dr. Reed 
concluded that not only defendant’s temporal lobes were damaged, but also his 
limbic system, which includes his amygdalae and hippocampus, parts of the brain 
that affect emotions and control basic urges such as fear and aggression.   
Dr. Alfred Fricke, a psychologist, diagnosed defendant as psychotic, with 
organic brain damage and a schizoid personality disorder.  He testified that 
defendant suffered from very basic cognitive impairments, such as his inability to 
figure out in which direction the sun rose in the morning and to determine his 
location on a map.  Defendant expressed to him remorse for the killings, and said 
he did not deserve to live.  Defendant described the killings to Dr. Fricke in a very 
detached manner, as if he was watching them on television.   
 13
Dr. Maxine Junge, an expert in art therapy, testified that defendant’s 
artwork showed him to be severely and chronically depressed.   
According to Dr. Timen Cermak, a psychiatrist, the serious damage to 
defendant’s amygdalae and temporal lobes – parts of the brain that are essential 
for normal personality development – caused him to develop a schizoid-
schizotypal personality, characteristics of which include social detachment, flat 
emotions, inability to perceive the moods and needs of others, magical thinking, 
and eccentric behavior.  Dr. Cermak explained that because of defendant’s serious 
disorder, he needed more attention than the average child while growing up, but 
that he actually received less because of the inadequacies of defendant’s parents.   
According to Dr. Cermak, when defendant became an adult he should have 
been placed in a structured setting such as a therapeutic board and care facility.  
Instead, he was left on his own, and his inability to manage his finances, perhaps 
abetted by hormonal changes resulting from his drastic loss of weight, caused him 
to decompensate into a psychotic state.  He began stealing food and small items 
from neighborhood stores, which resulted in his arrest and conviction for 
shoplifting.  The day after his conviction, angered by his belief that other 
shoplifters he had seen in court were given preferential treatment, he went into the 
Quik Stop store to steal beef jerky and committed the three murders there.  
A minister at the Sacramento County Jail and two county jail inmates 
testified that defendant actively participated in Bible study classes while he was in 
custody before and during the trial, that his religious beliefs seemed sincere, that 
he was a positive influence on other inmates, and that he had expressed remorse 
for the murders.   
A retired administrator who had worked at the California Department of 
Corrections for 30 years described the conditions experienced by inmates 
 14
sentenced to life imprisonment without possibility of parole, and said that if 
defendant received such a sentence he would adjust well in prison.   
II.  COMPETENCY ISSUES 
After defendant unexpectedly announced in open court, “I am guilty,” the 
defense asked Dr. George Wilkinson, a psychiatrist, to evaluate his competence to 
stand trial.  In Dr. Wilkinson’s view, defendant suffered from “a delusion:  ‘a 
Christian path to speak the truth whenever the Holy Spirit touches’ ” him, that had 
“more strength, validity and urgency than his rational understanding of the 
proceedings.”  He concluded that defendant was incompetent to stand trial because 
he could not cooperate with his attorneys as a result of “a Psychotic Disorder with 
Delusions due to Chronic Severe Epilepsy.”  Based on Dr. Wilkinson’s findings, 
the trial court declared a doubt as to defendant’s competence to stand trial.  It 
appointed two psychiatrists, Dr. Kourosh Lashi and Dr. Charles Schaffer, to 
examine defendant.  Both sides waived a jury, and the question of competence was 
decided at a court trial. 
At the court trial, Drs. Lashi and Schaffer both testified that the competency 
determination was difficult because of defendant’s low intelligence, his seizure 
disorder, and his mental impairment.  They agreed that defendant had become 
intensely religious while awaiting trial, and that he was not malingering or faking 
his symptoms.  But they disagreed as to whether defendant’s claimed observations 
of demons and angels showed that he was delusional and unable to cooperate with 
his attorneys. 
Dr. Lashi explained that defendant’s seizure disorder is known to 
sometimes cause “hyper-religiosity.”  In Dr. Lashi’s view, defendant suffered not 
only from a seizure disorder but also from an unspecified psychosis.  These caused 
him to experience religiously oriented delusions that made it impossible to 
cooperate with his attorneys.  Defendant told Dr. Lashi he observed angels and 
 15
demons  and that he saw ghosts in the courtroom.  Dr. Lashi concluded that 
defendant believed “he received signs from God that tell[] him how to behave . . . 
in court,” and these signs “supersede whatever his lawyers would recommend him 
to do.” 
Dr. Schaffer, on the other hand, testified that defendant was competent to 
stand trial.  His findings are also described in his 38-page, single-spaced written 
evaluation, which was admitted as an exhibit at the competency trial.   
Dr. Schaffer viewed defendant as suffering from possible bipolar disorder, 
possible schizophrenia, cannabis abuse in remission, a learning disorder, and a 
complex partial seizure disorder.  Defendant told him that he had announced his 
guilt in court because “[t]he spirit of God had influenced him, and he wanted to 
accept the spirit of God and go to heaven.”  Dr. Schaffer expressed uncertainty 
with regard to whether defendant’s deep religious beliefs “were of delusional 
proportions as opposed to strong non-psychotic feelings about religion.”  He 
acknowledged that defendant had difficulty responding to his questions:  Some of 
defendant’s sentences were disjointed and had no subject at the beginning, and he 
sometimes engaged in the tangential reasoning typical of those suffering from 
schizophrenia.  But Dr. Schaffer concluded that defendant had “a marginal, but 
adequate understanding of the nature of the current legal proceeding and of the 
legal process in general,” and he had “a positive relationship with his attorney.”   
The defense called as an expert witness Dr. William Lynch, a 
neuropsychologist and the director of the brain injury rehabilitation unit for the 
Veterans Health Administration hospital in Menlo Park.  Based on a series of tests 
he administered to defendant, Dr. Lynch described that defendant as having “mild 
to moderate neuropsychological impairment,” poor verbal memory, and problems 
with reading, spelling, and general verbal expression.  The tests showed no “clear 
indication” of “an acute, major psychosis,” but he diagnosed defendant as having a 
 16
schizoid personality, which he described as “not necessarily a person who is 
completely out of touch with reality . . . and grossly delusional and all that,” but 
rather a person “off center.”  His tests revealed no evidence of delusions.  
Dr. Lynch did not say whether he believed defendant was competent to stand trial. 
The defense also called as a witness Paula Thomas, defendant’s mother.  
She testified that defendant had a seizure disorder that she first observed when he 
was four years old.  The disorder was initially controlled by medication, but as 
defendant grew older the drugs were no longer able to prevent him from having 
seizures.  When he was six years old, defendant said he saw spirits, but at the time 
she considered it simply a childish fantasy.  When he was 19 years old, he again 
told her he was hearing voices.  Defendant did not attend church as a child, but 
since his arrest religion had become “all consuming.”   
Another defense witness, Michael Singer, a social worker who worked at 
the Sacramento County Jail, said that while awaiting trial defendant had 
complained of hearing voices, and said he was unsure whether the voices were in 
his head, outside his cell, or in the plumbing.   
Carolyn Lange, defendant’s lead counsel, testified that defendant had been 
cooperative with her before his sudden declaration of guilt in court, that he had 
begun carrying a Bible with him, and that he had sent her religious artwork.  She 
said her view about his ability to cooperate with her “changed drastically” as a 
result of defendant’s interview with Dr. Wilkinson in the wake of his outburst.   
The trial court found defendant competent to stand trial.  It acknowledged 
that defendant was suffering from a thought disorder and that he was not faking 
his symptoms, but it was persuaded by Dr. Schaffer’s report that defendant was 
nonetheless competent.   
 17
A.  Trial Court’s Failure to Appoint the Regional Director for the 
Developmentally Disabled to Examine Defendant 
When the trial court declared a doubt as to defendant’s competence to stand 
trial, it appointed two psychiatrists to examine him.  But it did not appoint the 
director of the regional center for the developmentally disabled to examine 
defendant, although it was aware that he suffered from epilepsy.  Defendant 
contends that the court’s failure to do so is a jurisdictional error requiring reversal 
of his convictions and death sentence. 
Subdivision (a) of section 1369 describes the procedures to be followed 
when a trial court declares a doubt as to a defendant’s competence to stand trial:  
“The court shall appoint a psychiatrist or licensed psychologist, and any other 
expert the court may deem appropriate, to examine the defendant. . . .  If it is 
suspected the defendant is developmentally disabled, the court shall appoint the 
director of the regional center for the developmentally disabled . . . to examine the 
defendant.  The court may order the developmentally disabled defendant to be 
confined for examination in a residential facility or state hospital.  [¶]  The 
regional center director shall recommend to the court a suitable residential facility 
or state hospital.  Prior to issuing an order pursuant to this section, the court shall 
consider the recommendation of the regional center director.  While the person is 
confined pursuant to order of the court under this section, he or she shall be 
provided with necessary care and treatment.”  (Italics added.)  And at the time of 
defendant’s trial, former subdivision (a)(1) (now subd. (a)(1)(H)) of section 
1370.1 provided:  “ ‘[D]evelopmental disability’ means a disability that originates 
before an individual attains age 18, continues, or can be expected to continue, 
indefinitely and constitutes a substantial handicap for such individual . . . .  [T]his 
term shall include mental retardation, cerebral palsy, epilepsy, and autism.”  
(Italics added.) 
 18
Defendant suffers from epilepsy, a disability that originated well before his 
18th birthday, is expected to continue indefinitely, and has constituted a 
substantial handicap for him.  Thus, his epilepsy falls within the definition of 
“developmental disability” in section 1370.1, and the trial court erred when it did 
not appoint the director of the regional center for the developmentally disabled to 
examine him as part of the competency proceedings, as required by section 1369. 
In contending that the trial court’s noncompliance with section 1369 
requires reversal, defendant relies on People v. Castro (2000) 78 Cal.App.4th 
1402 (Castro).  In Castro, the defendant was charged with child abuse and murder 
of her infant child.  After a court-appointed psychiatrist reported that the defendant 
was developmentally disabled, the trial court suspended proceedings to determine 
her competence, but it refused to appoint the director of the regional center to 
examine her, and instead appointed a psychiatrist to perform that task.  The 
psychiatrist concluded that the defendant had no psychiatric disease but suffered 
from an unspecified learning disability.  Based on this report the trial court found 
the defendant competent.  Later court proceedings revealed that the defendant was 
mentally retarded, with an IQ of 61 and the intelligence of a six-to-seven-year-old 
child. 
The Court of Appeal in Castro held that the trial court exceeded its 
jurisdiction when it failed to appoint the director of the regional center to examine 
the defendant, and that this failure required reversal of her conviction for second 
degree murder.  The court explained:  “When the relevant statutes set forth a 
specific procedure to be followed in determining whether a defendant is competent 
to stand trial, and those procedures have not been adhered to, the fundamental 
integrity of the court’s procedures have been compromised.  Due process requires 
that any doubt regarding the defendant’s competency be properly evaluated by 
experts prior to proceeding with trial.”  (Castro, supra, 78 Cal.App.4th at p. 1419.) 
 19
The Attorney General here argues that Castro, supra, 78 Cal.App.4th 1402, 
was wrongly decided and that reversal in this case is not required.  As explained 
below, we conclude that although the result in Castro may well be correct, Castro 
is wrong to the extent it holds that a trial court’s erroneous failure to appoint the 
director of the regional center to examine a developmentally disabled defendant 
whose competence is in question is a jurisdictional error that necessarily requires 
reversal of any ensuing conviction. 
To determine whether defendant here was prejudiced by the trial court’s 
failure to appoint the director of the regional center to evaluate him because of his 
developmental disability (§ 1369), we must first consider why the Legislature 
required the evaluation.  The statutory requirement appears to serve three 
functions.   
First, the evaluation assists the trial court in determining where the 
defendant should be confined pending the competency determination.  Subdivision 
(a) of section 1369 permits the trial court to confine a developmentally disabled 
defendant “for examination in a residential facility or state hospital.”  If the court 
chooses to do so, “[t]he regional center director shall recommend to the court a 
suitable residential facility or state hospital” and before issuing a confinement 
order “the court shall consider the recommendation of the regional center 
director.”  (Ibid.)   
Second, the regional director assists the trial court in selecting an 
appropriate placement for the defendant if the defendant is found incompetent.  
Subdivision (a)(1)(B)(i) of section 1370.1 provides that if a defendant found to be 
incompetent is developmentally disabled, criminal proceedings are suspended 
until the defendant becomes competent, and “the court shall consider a 
recommendation for placement, which recommendation shall be made to the court 
by the director of a regional center or designee.”   
 20
The third purpose of section 1369’s requirement of an evaluation by the 
regional director, and the only one relevant here, is to ensure that a 
developmentally disabled defendant’s competence to stand trial is assessed by 
those having expertise with such disability.  In the words of the California 
Department of Developmental Services (DDS), the state agency that oversees the 
regional centers:  “A valid assessment of a criminal defendant’s ability to stand 
trial requires a[] comprehensive, individualized examination of the defendant’s 
ability to function in a court proceeding.  A reliable assessment is achieved 
through thorough examinations of each individual by experts experienced in 
developmental disabilities.”2  A regional center, the DDS explains, is “the primary 
agency to provide expert advice relating to the assessment, needs, and abilities of a 
criminal defendant with developmental disabilities.”  Court-appointed 
psychiatrists and psychologists may not have this expertise, because their 
experience may pertain to mental illness rather than developmental disability.  
This was the case in Castro, where the two psychiatrists who evaluated the 
defendant’s competence made no “attempt to determine [the defendant’s] 
intelligence level or assess the extent of her developmental disability.”  (Castro, 
supra, 78 Cal.App.4th at p. 1418.)  
When a trial court suspends criminal proceedings based on a doubt that a 
criminal defendant is competent to stand trial, and the court thereafter fails to hold 
a competency hearing, the trial court “acts in excess of jurisdiction by depriving 
the defendant of a fair trial” (People v. Superior Court (Marks) (1991) 1 Cal.4th 
56, 70), and any ensuing criminal conviction must be set aside (People v. Marks 
                                              
2  
At the request of this court, the DDS has submitted an amicus curiae brief 
in this case, discussing the application of section 1369 to persons with 
developmental disabilities. 
 21
(1988) 45 Cal.3d 1335, 1340; People v. Hale (1988) 44 Cal.3d 531, 541).  But 
here, the trial court’s error was less egregious:  it failed to appoint the director of 
the regional center for the developmentally disabled to evaluate defendant.  Given 
the three statutory purposes of this evaluation that we have just described, 
defendant’s ensuing murder convictions and death sentence need not be reversed 
unless the error deprived him of a fair trial to determine his competency.  As we 
explain, the error was harmless. 
Unlike Castro, supra, 78 Cal.App.4th 1402, the trial court’s competency 
determination was based on evidence from experts who were familiar with 
defendant’s developmental disability and who considered it in evaluating his 
competence.  Dr. Schaffer, the court-appointed psychiatrist who testified that 
defendant was competent to stand trial, was a professor at the University of 
California at Davis Medical School and a diplomate of the American Board of 
Psychiatry and Neurology.  Even though he did not specialize in epileptic patients, 
he had observed patients who had seizures similar to those of defendant.  
Similarly, Dr. Lynch, the neuropsychologist who testified for the defense, had 
treated many epileptic patients, although his primary area of expertise pertained to 
head injuries, not epilepsy.  
Unlike the court-appointed psychiatrists in Castro, supra, 78 Cal.App.4th 
1402, neither of whom evaluated the developmental disability of the defendant in 
that case, Drs. Schaffer, Lynch, and Lashi testified at length about defendant’s 
developmental disability, epilepsy.  In addition, Dr. Schaffer’s report extensively 
discussed defendant’s epilepsy, and an appendix to his report listed eight articles 
in scholarly journals that Dr. Schaffer used as references in preparing his report, 
all of which dealt with epilepsy.   
In summary, appointment of the director of the regional center for the 
developmentally disabled (§ 1369, subd. (a)) is intended to ensure that a 
 22
developmentally disabled defendant is evaluated by experts experienced in the 
field, which will enable the trier of fact to make an informed determination of the 
defendant’s competence to stand trial.  Here, defendant was evaluated by doctors 
who possessed these qualifications, and their testimony provided a basis for the 
trial court’s ruling that defendant was competent to stand trial.  Thus, the court’s 
failure to appoint the director of the regional center to examine defendant did not 
prejudice defendant.3 
Defendant asserts that the trial court’s failure to appoint the regional 
director to evaluate him violated his rights under the federal Constitution to due 
process and a fair trial, as well as his Eighth Amendment right to a reliable guilt 
and penalty proceeding.  Not so.  The federal Constitution requires the states to 
“observe procedures adequate to protect a defendant’s right not to be tried or 
convicted while incompetent to stand trial.”  (Drope v. Missouri (1975) 420 U.S. 
162, 172.)  Here, notwithstanding the trial court’s failure to obtain an evaluation 
from the director of the regional center for the developmentally disabled, 
defendant’s competency trial protected his right not to be tried or convicted while 
incompetent. 
B.  Sufficiency of Evidence of Defendant’s Competency  
Defendant argues the evidence was insufficient to support the trial court’s 
ruling that he was competent to stand trial.  The court based its ruling on the 
testimony and report of Dr. Charles Schaffer, one of the two court-appointed 
psychiatrists, who examined defendant and concluded that defendant was 
                                              
3  
We disapprove Castro, supra, 78 Cal.App.4th 1402, to the extent it is 
inconsistent with the views expressed here. 
 23
competent.  Defendant argues that Dr. Schaffer’s testimony was fatally flawed in 
several respects.  For the reasons explained below, we disagree. 
Defendant asserts that although Dr. Schaffer concluded that defendant was 
not incompetent as a result of a psychiatric disorder, he never considered whether 
defendant was incompetent as a result of his seizure disorder, which is not a 
psychiatric disorder but a developmental disability.  According to defendant, a 
competency inquiry under section 1369 involves two distinct questions:  
(1) whether the accused is incompetent as a result of a psychiatric disorder, and 
(2) whether the accused is incompetent as a result of a developmental disability.  
To the contrary, these are not two separate questions, but one:  whether, based on 
a combination of all factors, including both psychiatric disorders and 
developmental disabilities, the defendant is competent to stand trial.   
Defendant bases his argument that Dr. Schaffer considered only his 
psychiatric disorders on one sentence in Dr. Schaffer’s 38-page report:  
Dr. Schaffer’s conclusion that “[t]here is insufficient evidence to conclude that 
Mr. Leonard is unable to assist his counsel in the conduct of a defense in a rational 
manner as a result of a psychiatric disorder.”  But the rest of Dr. Schaffer’s report 
and his testimony at the competency trial demonstrate that Dr. Schaffer considered 
not only defendant’s psychiatric disorder, but also his seizure disorder, when he 
concluded that defendant was competent.   
Defendant contends that Dr. Schaffer based his competency determination 
on the mistaken belief that defendant was incompetent only if (1) he could not 
understood the nature of the proceedings and (2) he was unable to assist defense 
counsel in a rational manner, whereas a defendant is incompetent if either of these 
statements are true.  (§ 1369.)  Although Dr. Schaffer initially misstated the 
statutory test, in response to cross-examination by defense counsel he corrected 
 24
himself, thereby demonstrating an accurate understanding of the correct legal 
standard.  
Dr. Schaffer’s report stated that defendant was “sufficiently able to 
understand the nature of the criminal proceedings” and there was “insufficient 
evidence to conclude that [defendant] is unable to assist his counsel in the conduct 
of a defense in a rational manner . . . .”  (Italics added.)  Based on the italicized 
language, defendant claims that Dr. Schaffer never actually decided whether 
defendant could rationally assist his attorneys.  Rather, he asserts, Dr. Schaffer 
believed defendant had the burden of proving to Dr. Schaffer that he was unable to 
do so, and Dr. Schaffer found defendant competent because he had not satisfied 
this burden.  As defendant points out, although he had the burden of proving his 
incompetence to the trier of fact (§ 1369, subd. (f)), he did not have the burden of 
proving it to Dr. Schaffer.   
Dr. Schaffer testified, however, that defendant had told him that he had a 
“positive relationship” with defense attorney Caroline Lang, that he trusted her, 
that he could communicate with her, and that he considered her a competent 
attorney.  Dr. Schaffer also mentioned that defendant appeared to interact 
appropriately with his attorneys during the competency hearing itself.  Viewing 
Dr. Schaffer’s testimony as a whole, we conclude that he based his determination 
that defendant could cooperate with his attorneys on his interview with, and 
observations of, defendant, not on a misguided view of the burden of proof. 
Defendant contends that Dr. Schaffer “really was not sure whether 
[defendant] was competent” and his “responses on all the most critical questions 
were completely equivocal.”  We disagree.  Although Dr. Schaffer expressed 
uncertainty as to whether defendant had experienced religious hallucinations and 
said it “wasn’t easy to try to assess” whether defendant’s behavior resulted from a 
“severe delusional disturbance driven by a psychiatric disorder” or whether he was 
 25
merely “very religious,” he unequivocally expressed his view that defendant “is 
competent to stand trial.”   
For all of these reasons, Dr. Schaffer’s testimony and report provide 
substantial evidence supporting the trial court’s competency determination. 
C.  Events Occurring After Trial   
Defendant argues that certain events after his trial demonstrate that he was 
incompetent at the time of trial and remains incompetent today.  He asserts that in 
November 2002 he was transferred from death row to the California Medical 
Facility at Vacaville and placed on psychotropic medication without his consent 
after he engaged in bizarre behavior, which included placing his hand in scalding 
water because he believed Jesus had commanded him to do so, and he relies on 
testimony at the hearing to involuntarily medicate him as evidence that he was 
incompetent at the time of trial.  On appeal, however, we review the appellate 
record for error, without considering matters not presented to the trial court.  (In re 
Zeth S. (2003) 31 Cal.4th 396, 405.)  The testimony cited by defendant might 
conceivably be relevant in a habeas corpus petition, but we do not consider it on 
this appeal.   
III.  PRETRIAL AND GUILT PHASE ISSUES 
A.  Denial of Motion for Change of Venue  
Defendant contends the trial court erred in denying his motion for change 
of venue. 
“A trial court should grant a change of venue when the defendant 
demonstrates a reasonable likelihood that in the absence of such relief, he cannot 
obtain a fair trial.”  (People v. Weaver (2001) 26 Cal.4th 876, 905.)  On appeal, we 
independently examine the record to determine whether a fair trial was obtainable.  
(People v. Panah (2005) 35 Cal.4th 395, 447.)  Both the trial court’s initial venue 
 26
determination and our independent evaluation are based on a consideration of five 
factors:  “(1) nature and gravity of the offense; (2) nature and extent of the media 
coverage; (3) size of the community; (4) community status of the defendant; and 
(5) prominence of the victim.”  (People v. Sully (1991) 53 Cal.3d 1195, 1237; see 
also Panah, supra, at p. 447.)   
Defendant asserts that neither the trial court nor this court should apply this 
five-factor test here; instead, he argues that the appropriate standard is what he 
describes as the “presumed prejudice rule.”  He claims the United States Supreme 
Court articulated this rule in Murphy v. Florida (1975) 421 U.S. 794, when it 
explained the basis for its holdings in three previous cases in which the high court 
held that the trial court had erred by denying the defendant’s motion for change of 
venue:  Rideau v. Louisiana (1963) 373 U.S. 723 (Rideau); Estes v. Texas (1965) 
381 U.S. 532 (Estes), and Sheppard v. Maxwell (1966) 384 U.S. 333 (Sheppard).   
In the words of the high court in Murphy:  “Prejudice was presumed in the 
circumstances under which the trials in Rideau, Estes, and Sheppard were held.  In 
those cases the influence of the news media, either in the community at large or in 
the courtroom itself, pervaded the proceedings.  In Rideau, the defendant had 
‘confessed’ under police interrogation to the murder of which he stood convicted.  
A 20-minute film of his confession was broadcast three times by a television 
station in the community where the crime and the trial took place.  In reversing, 
the Court did not examine the voir dire for evidence of actual prejudice because it 
considered the trial under review ‘but a hollow formality’—the real trial had 
occurred when tens of thousands of people, in a community of 150,000, had seen 
and heard the defendant admit his guilt before the cameras.  [¶]  The trial in Estes 
had been conducted in a circus atmosphere, due in large part to the intrusions of 
the press, which was allowed to sit within the bar of the court and to overrun it 
with television equipment.  Similarly, Sheppard arose from a trial infected not 
 27
only by a background of extremely inflammatory publicity but also by a 
courthouse given over to accommodate the public appetite for carnival.  The 
proceedings in these cases were entirely lacking in the solemnity and sobriety to 
which a defendant is entitled in a system that subscribes to any notion of fairness 
and rejects the verdict of a mob.”  (Murphy v. Florida, supra, 421 U.S. at pp. 798-
799.) 
We question defendant’s assertion that in Murphy v. Florida, supra, 421 
U.S. 794, the United States Supreme Court articulated a test for determining when 
a trial court should grant a motion for change of venue.  Rather, Murphy appears 
to describe a standard by which an appellate court assesses prejudice when a trial 
court has erroneously denied a motion for change of venue.  That is, it holds that 
when the influence of the news media has so completely “pervaded the 
proceedings” (id. at p. 799) in a criminal case that the trial is conducted in a 
“circus atmosphere” (ibid.) or becomes a “ ‘hollow formality’ ” (ibid.), the trial is 
so fundamentally unfair that the ensuing conviction must be reversed without 
regard to the strength of the prosecution’s case or the prospective jurors’ 
protestations of neutrality during voir dire.  For the same reason, we reject the 
Attorney General’s argument that defendant forfeited his right to rely on Murphy 
by not citing it in the trial court:  Because Murphy articulates a standard for 
appellate court review, it has little relevance at trial. 
In any event, this case does not resemble Rideau, supra, 373 U.S. 723, 
Estes, supra, 381 U.S. 532, or Sheppard, supra, 384 U.S. 333.  Unlike the “circus 
atmosphere” (Murphy, supra, 421 U.S. at p. 799) of the trials in Estes and 
Sheppard, here the trial court carefully limited media coverage of the trial.  And 
unlike Rideau, where the trial was held in a small community, where many had 
seen the defendant’s televised confession, here the trial was held in a large 
metropolitan area, and defendant did not make a televised confession.  Therefore, 
 28
the presumption of prejudice does not apply, and we here apply our standard five-
part test, described at the beginning of this part, to determine whether there was a 
reasonable likelihood that, as a result of the pretrial publicity, defendant could not 
have a fair trial. 
As the trial court acknowledged, the first factor – the nature and gravity of 
the offense – weighed heavily in favor of a change of venue.  Defendant was 
charged with not just one capital murder; he was charged with six murders.  In 
short, “[t]he ‘nature and gravity’ of the present offenses could not have been more 
serious.”  (People v. Ramirez (2006) 39 Cal.4th 398, 434.) 
The second factor pertains to the nature and extent of the media coverage.  
The media’s coverage of the case was sensational and extensive.  Early in the 
investigation a homicide detective described the murders as “thrill killings” 
committed by a man who “likes to kill,” and thereafter the media consistently 
described the perpetrator, both before and after defendant became a suspect, as the 
“Thrill Killer,” a highly pejorative moniker that was potentially prejudicial to 
defendant.  In his motion to change venue, defendant cited 556 television 
segments on the killings that appeared on local stations, as well as 130 newspaper 
articles, most of them in Sacramento Bee, the area’s largest newspaper.  Many of 
the television news segments and newspaper articles were the lead story.  As a 
result, public awareness of the case was very high:  According to two public 
opinion surveys conducted by the defense, approximately 85 percent of the public 
had heard of the case.  The second survey, conducted after defendant suddenly 
announced in the courtroom that he was guilty, revealed that more than half of the 
public were aware of the incident.  
But even the survey conducted after defendant’s in-court outburst showed 
that of those familiar with the case, only 22 percent considered him “definitely 
guilty” while an additional 36 percent believed he was “probably guilty.”  Thus, 
 29
much of the community was keeping an open mind on the question of defendant’s 
guilt.  The passage of time also reduced the likelihood that the media reports 
would prejudice defendant:  Most of the stories appeared in 1991 (when the crimes 
were committed and defendant was arrested), four years before defendant’s trial.  
Furthermore, the media did not mention any significant facts that would be 
inadmissible at trial, such as a criminal record or evidence obtained in an illegal 
search or interrogation.  For these reasons, we agree with the trial court that 
“[w]hile the extent of publicity and its nature are in favor of a change of venue . . . 
proper voir dire can overcome the potential prejudice.”   
The third factor – size of the community – weighed against a change of 
venue.  Sacramento County is, and was at the time of defendant’s trial, a large 
metropolitan area, with a population of over a million, including approximately 
850,000 potential jurors.  Based on these statistics, and defendant’s surveys of the 
public’s awareness of and attitude toward the case, the trial court concluded there 
were 425,000 people in the county who had not formed an opinion adverse to 
defendant, and 110,000 who had not heard of the case.  This suggested that a panel 
of unbiased jurors could be found to try the case.  Indeed, in People v. Pride 
(1992) 3 Cal.4th 195, 224, we upheld the trial court’s finding that Sacramento 
County’s size “weighed heavily against a change of venue,” even though in that 
case the trial occurred roughly a decade before the trial here, at a time when the 
county’s population was significantly smaller. 
The jurors selected to try this case bear out the trial court’s conclusion that 
an unbiased jury could be found.  Four jurors (Jurors 2, 4, 7, and 11) wrote in their 
questionnaires that they had no recollection of the case.4  Six others (Jurors 3, 8, 9, 
                                              
4  
The prospective jurors were not told that the trial involved the man 
identified by the media as the Thrill Killer; instead, they were given the names of 
 
(Footnote continued on next page.) 
 30
and 12) had minimal recollections of the matter:  they said either that their 
memory of the case was vague, that they had read about it only in 1991 (four years 
before trial), or that they remembered the case but could not recall any details.  
Two other jurors (Jurors 6 and 10) had somewhat more extensive memories of the 
case,5 but apparently this was not of great concern to the defense, which did not 
exercise a peremptory challenge against either juror even though it used only 13 of 
its 20 peremptory challenges.  (See People v. Daniels (1991) 52 Cal.3d 815, 854 
[“In the absence of some explanation for counsel’s failure to utilize his remaining 
peremptory challenges, or any objection to the jury as finally composed, we 
conclude that counsel’s inaction signifies his recognition that the jury as selected 
was fair and impartial.”].) 
The fourth factor – community status of the defendant – did not weigh 
heavily for or against a change of venue.  Although, as defendant points out, 
newspaper reports described him as a troubled “loner” with emotional and 
psychological problems, he had spent much of his childhood and all of his adult 
years in the Sacramento area, and he was not a member of any racial or ethnic 
                                                                                                                                      
 
 
(Footnote continued from previous page.) 
 
the defendant and the victims, and were told that the case involved three people 
shot to death in a Quik Stop store in February 1991, and three more people shot to 
death in a nearby Round Table restaurant a week later.  In a posttrial evidentiary 
hearing, a juror who had initially professed no recollection of the case testified that 
he had learned during the trial that this was the “Thrill Killer” case, and it is clear 
from his testimony that he had heard of the Thrill Killer before the trial.  Thus, 
some or all of the jurors who said they were unfamiliar with the case may have 
heard of the Thrill Killer, even though they did not recognize the case from the 
facts given in the jury questionnaire. 
5  
An alternate who replaced Juror 10 during deliberations was also familiar 
with the case. 
 31
group that could be subject to discrimination.  (Compare Odle v. Superior Court 
(1982) 32 Cal.3d 932, 940, 942 [the status of the defendant, a longtime resident of 
the county but a parolee described by the media as having mental problems, was a 
“neutral” venue factor].) 
The fifth, and final, factor examines the prominence of the murder victims.  
Although, as defendant points out, media accounts of the victims portrayed them 
in a sympathetic light, they were not well known in the community.  Thus, this 
factor weighed against a change of venue.  (See People v. Webb (1993) 6 Cal.4th 
494, 514.)  
In sum, after independently weighing the five factors described above, we 
conclude that defendant could, and did, obtain a fair trial in Sacramento County.  
Although the seriousness of the charges, the number of victims, and the media’s 
heavy coverage and description of defendant as the “Thrill Killer” make this a 
close case, we agree with the trial court that defendant failed to show a reasonable 
likelihood that he could not have a fair trial without a change of venue. 
B.  Admission of Defendant’s Statements to Sheriff’s Detectives and to 
Defendant’s Father  
Before defendant was arrested, he was taken to the Sacramento County 
Sheriff’s Department headquarters, where he made several damaging admissions.  
Later that evening, after he was placed under arrest, he made additional 
admissions to his father, who was permitted to have a recorded conversation with 
defendant in an interview room.  The trial court denied defendant’s motion to 
suppress these statements.  Defendant now challenges that denial. 
These are the pertinent facts: 
On June 5, 1991 Lieutenant Raymond Biondi and Detective Stanley Reed 
went to defendant’s home and asked him to come to the sheriff’s department to 
give fingerprints and answer some questions about the murders.  Defendant said 
 32
he was busy, but he agreed to come the next day.  Because defendant was unable 
to drive as a result of his epilepsy, Reed and Biondi picked him up the next day 
and drove him to the sheriff’s station.  Defendant, who was not handcuffed, sat in 
the back of the car.  Defendant was fingerprinted and led to an interview room, 
where he was seated.  The room contained a partially concealed video camera.  
Detective Reed then conducted a videotaped interview with defendant that lasted 
three and a half hours, during parts of which Lieutenant Biondi was also present. 
At the beginning of the interview, Detective Reed told defendant he was 
not under arrest, he did not have to answer any questions, and he was free to leave 
at any time.  Reed then asked defendant to take a lie detector test.  Defendant said 
he would not do so without consulting an attorney, but he agreed to answer 
questions.  Reed questioned defendant extensively about his activities on the two 
nights on which the murders occurred, and then asked permission to search 
defendant’s apartment.  Defendant refused, saying he would not do so without 
speaking to an attorney.  Reed then asked him about his familiarity with and use of 
firearms.  After initially denying that he had a gun or bullets, defendant said he 
had bought ammunition for a friend before a camping trip.  He refused to name the 
friend, and asked to make a telephone call.  He was allowed to do so.  After the 
telephone call, defendant told Biondi and Reed that the person he had spoken to 
had advised him to leave, but that he wanted to “get it over with.”   
Defendant then asked if he could make another telephone call.  Detective 
Reed permitted him to do so and left the interview room.  Defendant called his 
father, Douglas Leonard, and told him that the bullets used in the murders were 
the same kind as those used in his father’s gun, and that defendant had bought 
some bullets and had put them in his father’s ammunition box.  After defendant 
completed the call, Lieutenant Biondi and Detective Reed came back into the 
interview room, and defendant made a second telephone call to his father.  This 
 33
time, Lieutenant Biondi spoke to defendant’s father and confirmed that the father 
owned a gun.  Defendant then told Biondi and Reed that the bullets he had bought 
were the same kind of bullets as those used in the murders.   
Lieutenant Biondi and Detective Reed dropped defendant off at his home, 
where they took possession of his trench coat, a pair of shoes, and a box of bullets.  
They then went to his father’s home, where another deputy, Detective Fancher, 
took possession of the father’s gun.  That evening, Biondi and Reed learned that 
ballistics tests established the gun as the murder weapon, and they returned to the 
father’s house, where they arrested defendant.  The father told Biondi and Reed 
that defendant had told him that he had committed the murders.  Biondi and Reed 
transported defendant back to the sheriff’s department, where they placed him in 
the same interview room as before.   
At Detective Reed’s request, defendant’s father also came to the station.  
He asked to speak to defendant, explaining that he believed that someone else had 
masterminded the murders, and he wanted to see if defendant would tell him who 
it was.  Detective Reed told the father he could talk to defendant but the 
conversation would be recorded.  As the father entered the room where defendant 
was, Detective Reed told the two men that he and Lieutenant Biondi would be 
“monitoring” the conversation, and the father then told defendant their 
conversation would be “taped.”  In the ensuing conversation, the father repeatedly 
asked defendant whether anyone else was involved in the murders, and defendant 
said no one else was.   
At the evidence suppression hearing, the videotaped conversations were 
played, and Detective Reed testified to the events set forth above.  The defense 
called Dr. William Lynch, the neuropsychologist who also testified at the 
competency hearing and at the guilt phase of trial.  He described defendant’s 
mental limitations and concluded, after viewing the videotape of the interrogation, 
 34
that the environment of the interrogation room was coercive and defendant did not 
know he was free to leave, and that defendant had a seizure near the end of the 
questioning by Lieutenant Biondi and Detective Reed.   
1.  Defendant’s initial interrogation:  alleged Miranda violation 
Defendant contends his statements in the initial interrogation conducted by 
Lieutenant Biondi and Detective Reed were illegally obtained because they did not 
advise him of his Miranda rights. 
“Before being subjected to ‘custodial interrogation,’ a suspect ‘must be 
warned that he has a right to remain silent, that any statement he does make may 
be used as evidence against him, and that he has a right to the presence of an 
attorney, either retained or appointed.’ ”  (People v. Mayfield (1997) 14 Cal.4th 
668, 732, quoting Miranda v. Arizona (1966) 384 U.S. 436, 444.)  Here, it is 
undisputed that at the time of the interrogation defendant was a suspect:  Detective 
Reed so testified at the hearing on defendant’s suppression motion.  The trial court 
found, however, that there was no need to advise defendant of his Miranda rights 
because he was not subjected to custodial interrogation.  Defendant challenges that 
ruling. 
An interrogation is custodial when “a person has been taken into custody or 
otherwise deprived of his freedom of action in any significant way.”  (Miranda v. 
Arizona, supra, 384 U.S. at p. 444.)  Whether a person is in custody is an objective 
test; the pertinent inquiry is whether there was “ ‘ “a ‘formal arrest or restraint on 
freedom of movement’ of the degree associated with a formal arrest.” ’ ”  (People 
v. Ochoa (1998) 19 Cal.4th 353, 401.)   
Whether a defendant was in custody for Miranda purposes is a mixed 
question of law and fact.  (People v. Ochoa, supra, 19 Cal.4th at p. 401.)  When 
reviewing a trial court’s determination that a defendant did not undergo custodial 
 35
interrogation, an appellate court must “apply a deferential substantial evidence 
standard” (id. at p. 402) to the trial court’s factual findings regarding the 
circumstances surrounding the interrogation, and it must independently decide 
whether, given those circumstances, “a reasonable person in [the] defendant’s 
position would have felt free to end the questioning and leave” (ibid.).   
Defendant asserts that to determine whether a reasonable person in his 
position would have felt free to leave, we must decide whether a reasonable 
person with defendant’s age, low intelligence, and developmental disability would 
have felt free to leave.  Neither this court nor the United States Supreme Court has 
decided whether these factors should be considered in deciding whether a suspect 
is in custody (see generally Yarborough v. Alvarado (2004) 541 U.S. 652, 666-
668), but we will assume for the sake of argument that these factors may be 
considered.  Defendant also points out that the interrogation was initiated by the 
deputies, that he was fingerprinted before being questioned; that the interrogation 
was relatively long (three and a half hours) and took place in an interrogation 
room in the sheriff’s department; that the door to the interrogation room was 
closed and Detective Reed sat between defendant and the door; and that when, on 
one occasion, defendant tried to go down the hall to the bathroom, Detective Reed 
escorted him back to the interrogation room, asking him to wait in the 
interrogation room and not to “wander around.”   
Notwithstanding the facts cited by defendant, we agree with the trial court 
that he was not subjected to custodial interrogation.  Detective Reed repeatedly 
told defendant that he was not under arrest and he was free to end the questioning 
at any time and leave.  Indeed, at the end of the interrogation the deputies did not 
arrest him; instead they took him home.  When defendant asked to use the 
telephone, he was permitted to do so.  (See Miranda v. Arizona, supra, 384 U.S. at 
p. 445 [Miranda warnings are designed to protect suspects who are “cut off from 
 36
the outside world” and subjected to “incommunicado interrogation.”].)  The door 
to the interrogation room was not locked, and when defendant was left alone to 
make his telephone calls, he left the room to use the bathroom.  Significantly, after 
using the telephone, defendant told Detective Reed that the person he had spoken 
to had advised him to leave, but he preferred to remain and answer questions, and 
he later told his father on the telephone that he was “free to go.”  Although “the 
. . . determination of custody depends on the objective circumstances of the 
interrogation, not on the subjective views harbored by . . . the person being 
questioned” (Stansbury v. California (1994) 511 U.S. 318, 323), defendant’s 
comments reinforce our view that a reasonable person in his position would have 
felt free to leave. 
2.  Defendant’s conversation with his father:  alleged Miranda 
violation 
Defendant contends the trial court should have suppressed his videotaped 
conversation with his father, held in an interrogation room at the sheriffs’ 
department, because Miranda warnings did not precede that conversation.  (See 
Miranda v. Arizona, supra, 384 U.S. 436.)  Unlike defendant’s initial conversation 
with Lieutenant Biondi and Detective Reed, there is no dispute that defendant was 
in custody when the conversation with his father occurred, because it came after 
his arrest for the murders.  But the trial court, noting that Miranda warnings are 
required only before a custodial interrogation, ruled that no Miranda warnings 
were required because defendant’s conversation with his father was not an 
interrogation.   
Defendant challenges that ruling.  He relies on Rhode Island v. Innis (1980) 
446 U.S. 291, 301, which states that interrogation includes a “practice that the 
police should know is reasonably likely to evoke an incriminating response from a 
suspect.”  According to defendant, allowing his father to have a recorded 
 37
conversation with him in an interrogation room was a form of interrogation 
because the deputies knew the conversation was reasonably likely to invoke an 
incriminating response. 
The United States Supreme Court rejected a similar claim in Arizona v. 
Mauro (1987) 481 U.S. 520 (Mauro).  There, the high court held that police 
officers did not violate the defendant’s Miranda rights by granting the defendant’s 
wife’s request to talk to him in the presence of an officer, after the defendant had 
invoked his right to counsel.  The court stressed that the purpose of Miranda is to 
“prevent[] government officials from using the coercive nature of confinement to 
extract confessions that would not be given in an unrestrained environment” (id. at 
pp. 529-530) and that in Mauro the officers did not “implicate this purpose” (id. at 
p. 530) by allowing the defendant’s wife to talk to him. 
Defendant claims this case is distinguishable from Mauro because 
Lieutenant Biondi and Detective Reed, unlike the officers in Mauro, allowed 
defendant’s videotaped conversation with his father for the sole purpose of 
obtaining incriminating evidence; and Biondi and Reed, unlike the officers in 
Mauro, had good reason to believe the conversation would elicit such evidence.  
These distinctions, however, are not significant.  “Officers do not interrogate a 
suspect simply by hoping that he will incriminate himself.”  (Mauro, supra, 481 
U.S. at p. 529.)  A defendant’s “conversations with his own visitors are not the 
constitutional equivalent of police interrogation.”  (People v. Gallego (1990) 52 
Cal.3d 115, 170; see also People v. Mayfield, supra, 14 Cal.4th at p. 758.)  In 
short, “[p]loys . . . that do not rise to the level of compulsion or coercion to speak 
are not within Miranda’s concerns.”  (Illinois v. Perkins (1990) 496 U.S. 292, 
297.)  Here, Lieutenant Biondi and Detective Reed did not compel or coerce 
defendant to talk to his father.  Thus there was no need for Miranda warnings 
before the conversation.   
 38
3.  Allegation that the statements were involuntary 
Defendant asserts that the trial court should have suppressed both his initial 
statement to the police and his later conversation with his father because they were 
involuntarily obtained. 
“It long has been held that the due process clause of the Fourteenth 
Amendment to the United States Constitution makes inadmissible any involuntary 
statement obtained by a law enforcement officer from a criminal suspect by 
coercion.  [Citations.]  A statement is involuntary [citation] when, among other 
circumstances, it ‘was “ ‘extracted by any sort of threats . . . , [or] obtained by any 
direct or implied promises, however slight . . . .’ ” ’  [Citations.]  Voluntariness 
does not turn on any one fact, no matter how apparently significant, but rather on 
the ‘totality of [the] circumstances.’  [Citations.]”  (People v. Neal (2003) 31 
Cal.4th 63, 79.) 
On appeal, we uphold the trial court’s findings of historical fact, but we 
independently review its determination that defendant’s statements were 
voluntary.  (People v. Holloway (2004) 33 Cal.4th 96, 121; People v. Neal, supra, 
31 Cal.4th at p. 80.) 
In arguing that his statements were involuntary, defendant stresses his 
limited intelligence and developmental disability; his lack of experience with law 
enforcement (only one prior arrest for shoplifting); the circumstance that the 
statements were made in a small, windowless interrogation room; the length of the 
interrogation (three and a half hours); and defendant’s dependence on Lieutenant 
Biondi and Detective Reed for a ride home after the interrogation was complete.  
But a statement is voluntary unless there is “coercive police activity.”  (Colorado 
v. Connelly (1986) 479 U.S. 157, 167; see also People v. Smith (2007) 40 Cal.4th 
483, 502; People v. Benson (1990) 52 Cal.3d 754, 778.)  Here Biondi and Reed 
did not coerce defendant.  During the initial interrogation they repeatedly told him 
 39
he was free to leave at any time, and during defendant’s conversation with his 
father they were not even present.  At no time did they say or do anything to imply 
that defendant was required to talk.  We therefore independently conclude that, as 
the trial court ruled, defendant’s statements were voluntary. 
4.  Other allegations 
Defendant asserts the videotaping of his end of his telephone call to his 
father from the interrogation room violated the federal Constitution’s Fourth 
Amendment, the California Constitution’s right to privacy, and title III of the 
federal Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act of 1968.  He may not rely on 
the latter two grounds, however, because he did not raise them at trial.  (People 
v. Combs (2004) 34 Cal.4th 821, 845.)  In any event, the claim lacks merit.  The 
trial court found that defendant had no reasonable expectation of privacy because 
he knew he was being videotaped when he made the call.  Detective Reed’s 
testimony that defendant noticed the videocamera provides substantial evidence to 
support this finding.   
Defendant also contends Lieutenant Biondi and Detective Reed violated the 
federal Constitution’s Fourth Amendment, the California Constitution’s right to 
privacy, and title III of the Federal Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act 
of 1968 by audiotaping a conversation between his father and other family 
members, as well as a conversation between his father and Detective Reed.  He 
may not raise this claim because he failed to raise it at trial.  (People v. Combs, 
supra, 34 Cal.4th at p. 845.)  In any event, defendant’s own privacy rights were 
not violated because he was not a participant in these conversations.  
 40
C.  Admission of Defendant’s In-court Admission of Guilt  
On September 13, 1994, the trial court was considering a defense motion to 
exclude the media from the hearing on defendant’s motion for change of venue, 
when this exchange occurred: 
The Court:  “Let’s take a short break.  [¶]  Defendant has his finger up.” 
Defendant:  “I am guilty.”   
The defense later moved to bar the prosecution from using defendant’s 
statement at trial.  The trial court denied the motion.  At trial, the prosecutor called 
court reporter Mary Corbitt, who testified that she heard defendant say he was 
guilty, and that she recorded this statement in the transcript.   
Defendant argues that his statement was an offer to plead guilty and was 
therefore inadmissible under Evidence Code section 1153, which states:  
“Evidence of a plea of guilty, later withdrawn, or of an offer to plead guilty to the 
crime charged or to any other crime, made by the defendant in a criminal action is 
inadmissible in any action or in any proceeding of any nature, including 
proceedings before agencies, commissions, boards, and tribunals.”  (Italics added; 
see also Pen. Code, § 1192.4 [A plea of guilty that is not approved by the court 
“may not be received in evidence in any criminal, civil, or special action or 
proceeding of any nature”].)  The purpose of section 1153 is “to promote the 
public interest by encouraging the settlement of criminal cases without the 
necessity of a trial.”  (People v. Sirhan (1972) 7 Cal.3d 710, 745.) 
We agree with the trial court that defendant’s in-court outburst declaring 
that he was guilty was not a “bona fide offer to plead guilty” (People v. Sirhan, 
supra, 7 Cal.3d at p. 746), but simply an “unsolicited admission[]” (People 
v. Posten (1980) 108 Cal.App.3d 633, 648), that was not made inadmissible by 
Evidence Code section 1153.  Defendant did not say he wanted to enter a plea of 
guilty; that is, to formally admit that he had committed each of the charged crimes.  
 41
Rather, he said he was guilty, without explaining what he was guilty of.  No plea 
negotiations were underway, and to exclude statements of this kind would not 
encourage the settlement of criminal cases.  Thus, the trial court properly denied 
defendant’s motion to exclude the statement.6 
D.  Prosecutor’s Alleged Failure to Control Witness  
Detective Robert Bell testified for the prosecution that he had spoken to 
defendant while investigating the murders in this case.  The prosecutor asked Bell, 
“And what did you tell him?”  Bell replied:  “I explained to him that we were 
doing the investigation regarding the thrill killer, and that his name had come up 
as a result of being spoken to by officers the other evening, and asked if he’d be 
willing to come down to the sheriff’s department to talk to me.”  (Italics added.)  
The defense made no objection.  During the next recess, the trial court told the 
prosecutor, “prior to reconvening, will you have a word with regard to Detective 
Bell in terms of the stipulation that we have in terms of not referencing this matter 
as the thrill killer case?”  The prosecutor agreed to do so.  The stipulation referred 
to by the trial court does not appear in the record. 
Defendant contends the trial court’s comments show that the parties had 
stipulated that counsel and the witnesses would not mention that this was the 
matter referred to in the news media as the Thrill Killer case.  Based on this 
alleged stipulation, defendant asserts the prosecutor committed misconduct by 
asking the question that elicited Detective Bell’s reference to the Thrill Killer.  We 
                                              
6  
Defendant points out that the host of a nationally syndicated radio talk 
show described defendant’s “I am guilty” outburst at trial as a plea of guilty when 
he criticized the trial court for suspending proceedings to determine defendant’s 
competency after the outburst.  The commentator, however, was not a lawyer, did 
not witness defendant’s outburst, and had no personal knowledge of why it 
happened; thus, his characterization of it as a guilty plea is irrelevant.  
 42
assume for the sake of argument that the parties entered into such a stipulation.  
Nonetheless, defendant has forfeited the right to raise this claim because he did not 
object to the prosecutor’s question at trial.  (People v. Michaels (2002) 28 Cal.4th 
486, 528.)   
Even if defendant had preserved the issue, we would reject his contention.  
The prosecutor’s question was innocuous, and there is no evidence that he asked it 
with the intent to elicit a reference to the Thrill Killer.  Defendant argues it does 
not matter whether the prosecutor intended to elicit the reference when he asked 
the question, pointing out that misconduct may occur even when the prosecutor 
acts in good faith.  We disagree.  True, if the prosecutor had asked a question that 
was likely to elicit a reference to the Thrill Killer, the question would have been 
misconduct even if the prosecutor did not intend to elicit such a reference.  (See 
People v. Hill (1998) 17 Cal.4th 800, 823, fn. 1; People v. Bolton (1979) 23 
Cal.3d 208, 213-214.)  But here the prosecutor’s question was proper because it 
was not inherently likely to elicit a reference to the Thrill Killer and there was no 
evidence that the prosecutor asked it with the intent to elicit such a reference.   
Defendant claims the prosecutor committed misconduct by failing to 
admonish Detective Bell, before he testified, not to refer to defendant as the Thrill 
Killer before he testified.  This contention would lack merit even if defendant had 
not forfeited it by failing to object at trial.  “A prosecutor has the duty to guard 
against statements by his witnesses containing inadmissible evidence.  [Citations.]  
If the prosecutor believes a witness may give an inadmissible answer during his 
examination, he must warn the witness to refrain from making such a statement.”  
(People v. Warren (1988) 45 Cal.3d 471, 481-482.)  Here, the record does not 
show that the prosecutor had reason to believe that Detective Bell might refer to 
the Thrill Killer in his testimony, nor does it show what the prosecutor said to Bell 
on the subject before Bell testified.  Thus, there is no evidence that the prosecutor 
 43
violated his duty to guard against impermissible references during Bell’s 
testimony. 
E.  Alleged Prosecutorial Misconduct  
Defendant contends the prosecutor committed repeated acts of misconduct 
in his closing arguments to the jury.  Defendant’s failure to object at trial bars him 
from asserting this claim on appeal.  (People v. Kennedy (2005) 36 Cal.4th 595, 
626.)  Defendant argues we should overlook his failure to object because the 
prosecutor’s allegedly improper statements were so frequent that objections would 
have been futile.  (See People v. Hill, supra, 17 Cal.4th at p. 821.)  We disagree.  
As we explain, most of the challenged statements were proper and none of them 
prejudiced defendant. 
Defendant claims the prosecutor improperly appealed to the jurors’ 
passions and fears by repeatedly asking them to imagine themselves in the 
position of the murder victims.  As a general rule, a prosecutor may not invite the 
jury to view the case through the victim’s eyes, because to do so appeals to the 
jury’s sympathy for the victim.  (People v. Stansbury (1993) 4 Cal.4th 1017, 1057; 
People v. Fields (1983) 35 Cal.3d 329, 363.)  Here, however, the challenged 
comments had a permissible purpose.  Defense counsel had argued that defendant 
could not have been the killer because he was so weak and ineffectual that if he 
had tried to rob the victims they would have been able to take away his gun, or 
they would have scattered when he started shooting.  In this argument, it was 
defense counsel who asked the jurors to picture themselves as victims of the 
Round Table robbery.  In rebuttal, the prosecutor explained to the jury how the 
victims might have believed that cooperating with defendant would lessen their 
chances of bodily harm.  He, too, asked the jurors to put themselves in the victims’ 
 44
place.  We see nothing wrong with this approach, which was a reasoned rebuttal to 
defense counsel’s argument, not an appeal to the jurors’ sympathy for the victims.   
The prosecutor also asked the jurors to imagine the thoughts of the victims 
in their last seconds of life.7  We agree with defendant that this was improper.  
(See People v. Stansbury, supra, 4 Cal.4th at p. 1057.)  But the prosecutor’s 
passing remark could not have prejudiced defendant, given the overwhelming 
evidence of guilt. 
Defendant accuses the prosecutor of misconduct in describing defendant as 
a “fool,” a man who “looks like a harmless fool,” an “odd” and “strange” person, 
and a “very cunning individual” who is “much like an animal.”  These comments 
were proper because they were “reasonably warranted by the evidence.”  (People 
v. McDermott (2002) 28 Cal.4th 946, 1002.)  Defendant also complains that the 
prosecutor told the jury that witness Sallie Thomas had described defendant as 
having “shark-like” eyes, when Thomas actually never did so, but this minor 
inaccuracy was harmless under any standard. 
In response to defense counsel’s argument that prosecution witness Sallie 
Thomas (who was engaged to one of the murder victims) should not be credited 
because she “lost her fiancé, and she wants somebody punished,” the prosecutor 
said:  “At 11:25 Sallie Thomas sees a person wearing a trench coat walking in the 
direction of Auburn Boulevard on Annadale Lane.  [¶]  Now certainly she’s 
                                              
7  
The prosecutor said:  “You know, Ms. Lange talk [sic] about in connection 
with the Round Table Pizza, imagine yourself, put yourself there.  I ask you to put 
yourself there, also.  [¶]  Imagine in that last millisecond before the lights go out, 
when you hear the report of the gun, when you feel the wetness, which they do not 
know but we would know, the small vapor of blood that is blown out the back or 
the side of their head and they fall to the floor, and in their last moment of 
consciousness, they think, I misjudged this man.”   
 45
grieving, certainly she’s angry, certainly she wants justice, but did she imagine she 
saw a man in a trench coat?  Did she make that up out of whole cloth?  No, she 
didn’t.”  Defendant argues that by this comment the prosecutor was improperly 
“vouching” for Thomas.  In our view, the prosecutor did not do so; instead, he 
merely argued that Thomas’s testimony was credible.  We find no error. 
In his rebuttal the prosecutor, after acknowledging that defendant did not 
have the burden of proof, went on to say:  “But [defendant] has an obligation 
when he undertakes to put evidence on to be true to you, the people that he’s 
asking – he’s asking you to believe his evidence.  So he has an obligation to be 
true to you.  [¶]  And what did he prove?  What did he prove?  [¶]  In a week and a 
half’s worth of testimony, he proved that he has epilepsy.”  The prosecutor then 
pointed out that the defense had called a ballistics expert, Dr. John Thornton, to 
testify about the crime scenes, but that the defense had not questioned Thornton 
about the testimony of the prosecution’s expert witness that the gun belonging to 
Douglas Leonard, defendant’s father, had fired the fatal shots.  Defendant 
contends this argument by the prosecutor improperly shifted to the defense the 
burden of proving that the gun was not the murder weapon and implied that the 
defense had not met this burden.  In our view, the prosecutor’s argument did not 
shift the burden of proof; rather, he was simply contending that the defense 
witnesses had not undermined the prosecution’s case. 
In closing argument, defense counsel noted there were no bloodstains on 
the trench coat and the gloves found in defendant’s apartment when he was 
arrested, four months after the murders.  In rebuttal, the prosecutor told the jury:  
“[L]et’s give Mr. Leonard a little bit of credit, huh?  I mean, obviously, he has a 
full scale 80 IQ.  Again, you don’t have to be a rocket scientist to entertain this 
thought.  Here’s the thought I want you to entertain:  [¶]  As soon as I leave 
[Detective] Robert Bell’s company and he takes me back home, what am I going 
 46
to do?  I’m going to think about all the things that might have evidentiary value.  
I’m going to get rid of them, clean them up or something.  I don’t want these cops 
to pin this on me.  [¶]  And he had four months to do that.  He didn’t have 24 
hours.  He didn’t have one afternoon.  He had a whole lot of time, and he knew 
that the cops were out there.”   
Defendant claims this argument was improper because there was no 
evidence that he had cleaned his clothing to remove the bloodstains.  The 
prosecutor, however, did not suggest there was any such evidence.  Rather, he 
merely pointed out that the absence of bloodstains on the coat and gloves did not 
mean defendant was innocent, because defendant had ample time to clean the 
clothes in the four months that elapsed between the time Detective Bell first 
interviewed him and the time he was arrested for the murders.  We see nothing 
improper in this argument. 
Finally, defendant accuses the prosecutor of misconduct when he briefly 
mentioned defendant’s refusal to take a polygraph test.  But defendant’s refusal to 
take the test was included in defendant’s statement to the police, which the court 
admitted into evidence.  Although the portion of defendant’s statement in which 
he refused to take the test was subject to exclusion upon proper objection (Evid. 
Code, § 351.1), the defense did not object, and the prosecutor was free to 
comment on it once it was admitted into evidence.   
F.  Trial Court’s Midtrial Dismissal of Juror  
On the morning of Monday, October 23, 1995, after the guilt phase of trial 
had been underway for a month, the trial court told the parties that the previous 
evening a juror had left a recorded telephone message at the court saying that the 
juror’s father-in-law had died over the weekend.  After receiving the message, the 
court explained, the court clerk telephoned the juror’s home; unable to reach the 
 47
juror, the clerk talked to the juror’s wife.  She said her father had been killed in an 
automobile accident, that she and her husband would be attending the out-of-town 
funeral, and that her husband would be unavailable as a juror for the rest of the 
week.  The court announced its tentative intention to discharge the juror and to 
replace him with an alternate.   
The prosecutor and defense counsel both objected, each stating a preference 
to keep the juror.  The trial court overruled their objections and replaced the juror.  
Defendant argues the court violated section 1089 and his “rights to a chosen 
impartial tribunal, due process, and a reliable judgment under the Fifth, Sixth, and 
Fourteenth Amendments” to the federal Constitution, as well as analogous 
provisions of the state Constitution.  We disagree. 
Section 1089 provides:  “If at any time . . . a juror dies or becomes ill, or 
upon other good cause shown to the court is found to be unable to perform his or 
her duty, or if a juror requests a discharge and good cause appears therefor, the 
court may order the juror to be discharged and draw the name of an alternate, who 
shall . . . be subject to the same rules and regulations as though the alternate juror 
had been selected as one of the original jurors.”  “Once a trial court is put on 
notice that good cause to discharge a juror may exist, it is the court’s duty ‘to 
make whatever inquiry is reasonably necessary’ to determine whether the juror 
should be discharged.”  (People v. Espinoza (1992) 3 Cal.4th 806, 821.)  On 
appeal, the trial court’s determination is reviewed for abuse of discretion.  (People 
v. Cunningham (2001) 25 Cal.4th 926, 1029; People v. Ashmus (1991) 54 Cal.3d 
932, 987.)  
Defendant claims the trial court did not conduct an adequate inquiry to 
determine whether discharge of the juror was necessary, because neither the court 
nor the court clerk spoke to the juror himself.  We disagree.  Although it would 
have been preferable for the clerk to have spoken to the juror himself, we conclude 
 48
the juror’s absence from court, combined with his recorded telephone message to 
the court explaining his absence and the information provided to the clerk by the 
juror’s wife, was adequate to inform the court why the juror was not present, the 
reason for his absence, and the length of time he would be unavailable for jury 
service.  No further inquiry was required. 
We also reject defendant’s claim that the trial court abused its discretion 
when it found good cause to discharge the juror.  We have in the past rejected 
similar claims in similar circumstances.  (See People v. Cunningham, supra, 25 
Cal.4th at pp. 1028-1030 [juror’s father near death after suffering stroke]; People 
v. Ashmus, supra, 54 Cal.3d at pp. 986-87 [death of juror’s mother]; In re Mendes 
(1979) 23 Cal.3d 847, 852 [death of juror’s brother].)  Although defendant tries to 
distinguish these cases on the ground that in each matter the juror expressly asked 
to be discharged, no such request is required.  (See Cunningham, supra, at 
pp. 1029-1030.) 
Defendant’s contention that the discharge violated the state and federal 
Constitutions is based on the argument that the discharge violated section 1089, a 
premise we just rejected.  Defendant acknowledges that we have held that section 
1089 “does not offend constitutional proscriptions” (People v. Collins (1976) 17 
Cal.3d 687, 691) and he does not argue to the contrary.  Thus, our conclusion that 
the trial court did not violate that statute necessarily disposes of his constitutional 
claims. 
G.  Alleged Juror Misconduct  
Defendant contends his six murder convictions must be reversed because of 
three instances of juror misconduct at the guilt phase of trial.  We address each in 
turn. 
 49
1.  Refusal to deliberate 
After the verdict, defendant moved for a new trial, alleging that Juror 8 was 
guilty of misconduct for refusing to participate in guilt phase deliberations.  
Defendant submitted affidavits from four jurors (Jurors 2, 3, 5, and 12), each of 
which stated that at the outset of deliberations, Juror 8 said that defendant was 
guilty as charged and there was nothing to discuss.  During the rest of the guilt 
phase deliberations, as the other jurors sat around the table discussing the case, 
Juror 8 sat in a corner reading a book.  Attempts by other jurors to involve him in 
the deliberations were unsuccessful.8   
The prosecutor did not dispute the accuracy of the declarations.  While he 
acknowledged that Juror 8’s refusal to deliberate was “perhaps misconduct,” he 
argued that any such misconduct did not give rise to a presumption of prejudice.  
The trial court agreed with the prosecutor and denied defendant’s motion for a 
new trial. 
We agree with defendant that Juror 8 committed misconduct by refusing to 
deliberate.  “A refusal to deliberate consists of a juror’s unwillingness to engage in 
the deliberative process; that is, he or she will not participate in discussions with 
fellow jurors by listening to their views and by expressing his or her own views.  
Examples of refusal to deliberate include, but are not limited to, expressing a fixed 
conclusion at the beginning of deliberations and refusing to consider other points 
of view, refusing to speak to other jurors, and attempting to separate oneself 
physically from the remainder of the jury.”  (People v. Cleveland (2001) 25 
                                              
8  
The declarations also stated that at the outset of the penalty phase 
deliberations, Juror 8 announced his view that defendant should be sentenced to 
death, and thereafter retired to a corner of the room to read his book.  We address 
defendant’s claim that Juror 8 committed prejudicial misconduct during the 
penalty phase deliberations in part IV. D. 2, post. 
 50
Cal.4th 466, 485.)  Here, Juror 8 committed all three of the acts that, we said in 
Cleveland, are examples of a refusal to deliberate:  He expressed a fixed 
conclusion at the beginning of deliberations and refused to consider other points of 
view, he refused to speak to other jurors, and he tried to separate himself 
physically from the rest of the jury by sitting in a corner.  This was misconduct.  
(People v. Engelman (2002) 28 Cal.4th 436, 443-444.) 
Defendant asserts that Juror 8’s refusal to deliberate violated his right to a 
jury trial under article I, section 16 of the California Constitution.  (See generally, 
People v. Collins, supra, 17 Cal.3d at p. 693.)  We need not decide whether he is 
correct, because any error was harmless.   
Unlike other forms of juror misconduct that call into question a juror’s 
impartiality (such as receiving extrinsic evidence or discussing the case with 
nonjurors), Juror 8 was without question an impartial juror.  (See People v. Nesler 
(1997) 16 Cal.4th 561, 581 [“An impartial juror is someone ‘capable and willing 
to decide the case solely on the evidence’ presented at trial.”].)  His misconduct 
pertained not to his ability to be fair, but to his behavior during deliberations:  
Because he concluded that the evidence of guilt was so overwhelming that there 
was nothing to talk about, he refused to discuss his conclusion with the other 
jurors.  This misconduct resulted in the jury operating not as a single unit, but as 
two separate units:  a group of 11 jurors who, after discussing the case among 
themselves, unanimously concluded that defendant was guilty, and a “group” 
consisting of a single juror (Juror 8), who separately reached the same conclusion.   
Because both of these two entities, considering the case separately, 
unanimously reached the same conclusion (that defendant was guilty), the 
inference is inescapable that they would have reached the same conclusion if they 
had discussed the case together.  Thus, the failure of the two entities to discuss the 
case with each other was harmless.  Similarly, if the jury had divided itself into 
 51
two groups of six, and each group had separately, but unanimously, concluded that 
defendant was guilty, no prejudice would result from the failure of the two groups 
to combine their discussions.  Because each group reached a verdict, this is not the 
type of “structural error” that occurs when a jury, or even a single juror, fails to 
reach a verdict.  (Compare Sullivan v. Louisiana (1993) 508 U.S. 275, 280 [“There 
being no jury verdict of guilt-beyond-a-reasonable-doubt, the question whether the 
same verdict of guilty-beyond-a-reasonable-doubt would have been rendered 
absent the constitutional error is utterly meaningless.  There is no object, so to 
speak, upon which harmless-error analysis can operate.”].) 
Defendant contends that Juror 8’s misconduct violated the federal 
Constitution.  We disagree.  That Constitution permits a verdict by less than 12 
jurors (Williams v. Florida (1970) 399 U.S. 78, 102-103; see also Apodaca v. 
Oregon (1972) 406 U.S. 404, 406 [federal Constitution does not require jury 
unanimity]), and the federal rules permit judges to accept an 11-juror verdict if a 
juror becomes unavailable.  (Fed.R.Crim.P., rule 23(b), 18 U.S.C.)  Thus, if the 
trial court here had discharged Juror 8 without appointing a replacement, and the 
remaining 11 jurors had convicted defendant, it would not have violated the 
federal Constitution.  (See United States v. Barone (1st Cir. 1997) 114 F.3d 1284, 
1308, fn. 21, and cases cited therein.)  It necessarily follows that the verdict 
returned by those 11 jurors along with Juror 8 did not violate the federal 
Constitution, notwithstanding the latter’s refusal to participate in the deliberative 
process.  Defendant also asserts that Juror 8’s refusal to deliberate violated the 
federal Constitution because he prejudged the case.  But we see no evidence of 
prejudging; rather, Juror 8 apparently concluded, based on the evidence presented 
at trial, that the evidence of defendant’s guilt was so overwhelming that there was 
nothing left to discuss. 
 52
Defendant contends the trial court erred by failing to investigate the 
possibility of jury misconduct when the bailiff, after bringing an exhibit to the jury 
during deliberations, reported to the court that some jurors were “not 
participating.”  Assuming for the sake of argument that the court should have 
investigated, its failure to do so does not require reversal unless the record shows 
that defendant was prejudiced.  (People v. Burgener (1986) 41 Cal.3d 505, 521-
522.)  Here, even if an investigation by the trial court had revealed that Juror 8 had 
been refusing to deliberate, we have just concluded that Juror 8’s refusal to 
deliberate was harmless.  It follows that the trial court’s failure to investigate the 
possibility that a juror was refusing to deliberate was equally harmless. 
2.  Jury’s alleged failure to begin deliberations anew when alternate 
juror was substituted. 
Guilt phase jury deliberations began on Tuesday, November 14, 1995.  The 
jury deliberated on Tuesday afternoon, Wednesday, and Thursday morning, 
although the jury spent much of this time listening to audiotapes and viewing 
videotapes that were admitted into evidence, and listening to readback of 
testimony.  No deliberations were held Thursday afternoon because Juror 4 had 
become ill.  On Friday Juror 4 was still ill, and the trial court learned that on 
Thursday night, a man had broken into Juror 10’s home and forcibly sodomized 
her.  The court declared a recess until Monday morning.  That day, Juror 4 had 
recovered from her illness, but Juror 10 asked to be excused.  The trial court 
replaced Juror 10 with an alternate juror.  The jury then deliberated for roughly 
two and one-half hours before notifying the court that it had reached a verdict.   
Defendant points out that when, as here, a juror is replaced after the jury 
has engaged in deliberations, the jury must deliberate anew, and that the original 
jurors must be instructed to disregard their previous deliberations.  (People 
v. Collins, supra, 17 Cal.3d at p. 694.)  Defendant acknowledges that the jury here 
 53
was instructed to do just that, but he contends it could not have done so because it 
deliberated for only a short time before arriving at its verdict.  He argues that the 
original jurors’ alleged failure to disregard their previous deliberations violates not 
only his right to jury trial under the state Constitution (see Collins, supra, at 
pp. 693-694), but also did not satisfy the heightened standard of reliability 
required in capital cases by the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments to the federal 
Constitution. 
There was no violation of either Constitution.  Other than noting the brevity 
of the deliberations, defendant offers no reason to believe that the original jurors 
disregarded the trial court’s instruction that they put aside their previous 
deliberations and begin anew.  But the brevity of the deliberations proves nothing.  
(See generally People v. Daugherty (1953) 40 Cal.2d 876, 890 [guilty verdict after 
75 minutes of deliberations at guilt phase of capital trial did not demonstrate jury 
bias]; People v. Mundt (1939) 31 Cal.App.2d 685, 690 [guilty verdict after six 
minutes of deliberations was not improper].)  The newly constituted jury was not 
required to deliberate for the same length of time as the original jury, nor was it 
required to review the same evidence.  When, as here, there are no indications to 
the contrary, we assume that the jurors followed the trial court’s instructions and 
started afresh.  (See People v. Mickey (1991) 54 Cal.3d 612, 689, fn. 17 [“The 
crucial assumption underlying our constitutional system of trial by jury is that 
jurors generally understand and faithfully follow instructions.”].) 
3.  Expressing an opinion about the accuracy of the murder weapon 
In declarations submitted by defendant in support of his new trial motion, 
Jurors 2, 3, and 5 mentioned that during the deliberations Juror 7 said he had 
experience firing handguns, and that the murder weapon was an “up close and 
personal” gun that could be accurately fired at close range without expertise.  
 54
Juror 12 stated, without elaboration, that Juror 7 told the jury that he had “ ‘plenty 
of experience firing handguns.’ ”   
Defendant argues that Juror 7 committed misconduct “by introducing into 
deliberations extrinsic evidence, derived from his own expertise, which 
contradicted the testimony of the defense expert.”  We disagree.   
A jury’s verdict in a criminal case must be based on the evidence presented 
at trial, not on extrinsic matters.  (People v. Nesler, supra, 16 Cal.4th at p. 578.)  
Nevertheless, jurors may rely on their own experiences in evaluating the testimony 
of the witnesses.  “Jurors do not enter deliberations with their personal histories 
erased, in essence retaining only the experience of the trial itself.  Jurors are 
expected to be fully functioning human beings, bringing diverse backgrounds and 
experiences to the matter before them.”  (Moore v. Preventive Medicine Medical 
Group, Inc. (1986) 178 Cal.App.3d 728, 741-742.)  “Jurors bring to their 
deliberations knowledge and beliefs about general matters of law and fact that find 
their source in everyday life and experience.  That they do so is one of the 
strengths of the jury system.  It is also one of its weaknesses:  it has the potential 
to undermine determinations that should be made exclusively on the evidence 
introduced by the parties and the instructions given by the court.  Such a 
weakness, however, must be tolerated. . . . [Otherwise,] few verdicts would be 
proof against challenge.”  (People v. Marshall (1990) 50 Cal.3d 907, 950.) 
Here, Juror 7 relied on his personal experience with firearms to form an 
opinion about the accuracy of the murder weapon, and he mentioned his 
experience to the other jurors when expressing his views during deliberations.  His 
comments were a normal part of jury deliberations and were not misconduct.  (See 
generally People v. Yeoman (2003) 31 Cal.4th 93, 162 [jurors’ comments 
regarding drug use by family members and the jurors themselves were not 
misconduct]; People v. Fauber (1992) 2 Cal.4th 792, 838-839 [same].)   
 55
4.  Cumulative error 
Defendant argues that he was prejudiced by the cumulative effects of the 
three alleged acts of misconduct described above.  As we have explained, 
however, only one of the three – Juror 8’s refusal to deliberate – was misconduct.  
Thus, there are no cumulative effects to consider. 
H.  Alleged Cumulative Guilt Phase Error  
Defendant asserts the combined effect of all of the errors at the guilt phase 
of trial requires reversal of his murder convictions.  The only error we have found 
is the jury misconduct discussed in part III. G. 1, ante.  There is thus no 
cumulative error. 
IV.  PENALTY ISSUES 
A.  Trial Court’s Failure to Conduct New Competency Hearing During 
Penalty Phase  
Defendant argues that the testimony presented by the defense at the penalty 
phase of trial pertaining to the damage to his brain gave rise to new doubts as to 
defendant’s competence to stand trial, and that after hearing this evidence the trial 
court should have suspended proceedings to hold a second competency trial. 
“Once a defendant has been found competent to stand trial, a second 
competency hearing is required only if the evidence discloses a substantial change 
of circumstances or new evidence is presented casting serious doubt on the 
validity of the prior finding of the defendant’s competence.”  (People v. Medina 
(1995) 11 Cal.4th 694, 734; see also People v. Weaver, supra, 26 Cal.4th at p. 
954; People v. Jones (1991) 53 Cal.3d 1115, 1153-1154.)   
Defendant does not claim that the penalty phase evidence demonstrated a 
“ ‘substantial change of circumstances’ ” (People v. Weaver, supra, 26 Cal.4th at 
p. 954); he argues, however, that it cast “ ‘serious doubt on the validity of’ ” 
(ibid.) the prior competency finding.  He points to testimony by Dr. Bruce Reed, a 
 56
neuropsychologist, who concluded that a PET scan of defendant’s brain showed 
severe damage to defendant’s temporal lobes, hippocampi, and amygdalae, and he 
notes corroborating testimony by Dr. Timmen Cermak, an expert in psychology 
and neurology.  According to defendant, this testimony showed that the 
“traditional psychological approach” used by the doctors at the competency 
hearing “resulted in an incomplete understanding of [defendant’s] condition 
because it failed to consider the brain damage underlying [defendant’s] epilepsy as 
the central and defining feature of his personality,” and thus the trial court should 
have ordered a new competency hearing.  
Although Drs. Reed and Cermak testified at the penalty phase that 
defendant’s seizure disorder had caused significant damage to his brain, persons 
with significant brain damage may nonetheless be competent to stand trial.  
Neither doctor testified that defendant did not satisfy the statutory test for 
competence to stand trial, that is, that he lacked the ability to understand the nature 
of the proceedings or to cooperate with his counsel.   
The doctors who testified at defendant’s competency hearing had not seen 
the results of the PET scan of his brain that defendant’s penalty phase witnesses 
cited as evidence of his brain damage, but they were well aware of defendant’s 
seizure disorder as well as the likelihood of brain damage when they evaluated his 
competence to stand trial.  For instance, Dr. Charles Schaffer’s report, introduced 
as an exhibit at the competency hearing, mentioned that defendant had a seizure 
during his interview with Dr. Schaffer, and it made reference to 
electroencephalograph studies showing that defendant had “temporal lobe 
damage,” and to Dr. William Lynch’s finding that defendant had “an organic brain 
disorder with mild to moderate neuropsychologic impairment.”  Dr. Schaffer 
nevertheless concluded that defendant was competent to stand trial, an assessment 
that persuaded the trial court.  Thus, the penalty phase testimony of Drs. Reed and 
 57
Cermak did not cast “ ‘serious doubt on the validity of’ ” the previous competency 
determination (People v. Weaver, supra, 26 Cal.4th at p. 954), and that testimony 
did not necessitate a suspension of the criminal proceedings and a second 
competency hearing. 
Defendant relies on Odle v. Woodford (9th Cir. 2001) 238 F.3d 1084.  
There, a federal appellate court held that the trial court in a capital case erred by 
failing to hold a competency hearing when the defendant presented evidence that 
he had a partial lobectomy after an automobile accident, after which he exhibited 
bizarre behavior that led several times to admissions to psychiatric wards.  
Decisions of the federal circuit courts are not binding on us, and in any event Odle 
is distinguishable.  There, the trial court held no competency hearing, and the issue 
was whether it should have done so.  By contrast, here the trial court held a 
hearing at which it found defendant competent to stand trial.  The question is 
whether the court should have held a second hearing.  The answer is no.  We find 
nothing in Odle’s reasoning that would undermine that conclusion. 
B.  Alleged Prosecutorial Misconduct  
Defendant argues that the prosecutor improperly tried to minimize the 
jury’s responsibility for its penalty decision (see Caldwell v. Mississippi (1985) 
472 U.S. 320) when he told the jury:  “Regardless of what penalty is imposed on 
Mr. Leonard, you ought to think about this:  Mr. Leonard is going to have some 
life.  He is going to continue to live.  Whether you give him the death penalty or 
life without the possibility of parole, it’s not over for Mr. Leonard, at least not for 
the foreseeable future.  [¶]  For these people, it was over with five years ago.  
There’s nothing more.  All the dreams, all the hopes, all the love, all the 
everything they had was snatched away from them in one second.”   
 58
Although defendant did not object to the prosecutor’s argument at trial, he 
is not barred from making this claim on appeal because no objection was required 
at the time of defendant’s trial.  (People v. Moon (2005) 37 Cal.4th 1, 17; People 
v. Cleveland (2004) 32 Cal.4th 704, 762.)  Nevertheless, we find no Caldwell 
error.  The prosecutor’s point was that the victims died as soon as defendant shot 
them, whereas defendant was still alive at the time of trial, five years after the 
murders, and he would still be alive during the appeal.  Whether or not this was 
proper argument, it did not minimize the jury’s responsibility for its penalty 
decision.  (See generally People v. Bittaker (1989) 48 Cal.3d 1046, 1106.)  
Moreover, the comment, even if improper, was a brief and oblique reference that 
was harmless under any standard of prejudice. 
Defendant also asserts that the prosecutor tried to diminish the jury’s 
responsibility for its decision when he told the jury that it would not be killing 
anyone by returning a verdict of death.  That comment occurred in this argument 
by the prosecutor:  “Now, certainly you have the responsibility for deciding 
Mr. Leonard’s fate.  No one will tell you, I will not tell you, no one will tell you 
anything to diminish that responsibility.  It is a heavy responsibility.  I know you 
take it seriously.  [¶]  However, you did not kill anyone.  You will not kill anyone.  
You will make a decision based upon the evidence.  It obviously has dire 
consequences, assuming you decide the death penalty is appropriate for 
Mr. Leonard.”  (Italics added.)  Read in context, the italicized remark was an 
appropriate commentary on the nature of the jury’s task, which was to “make a 
decision based on the evidence.”  The prosecutor was careful to remind the jury of 
the “dire consequences” of a death verdict and in no way diminished the jury’s 
responsibility for its decision.   
Defendant contends that several other remarks by the prosecutor in closing 
argument were misconduct.  He may not now challenge those comments because 
 59
he did not object to them at trial, nor did he ask the trial court to admonish the jury 
to disregard them.  (People v. Avila (2006) 38 Cal.4th 491, 609.)  Defendant 
insists, however, that his motion “to restrict the scope of the prosecutor’s penalty 
phase argument”  preserved his right to challenge, on appeal, the prosecutor’s 
statements in closing argument.   
That defense motion, filed before the penalty phase began, was in essence a 
trial brief that summarized the limitations on prosecutorial argument at the penalty 
phase of a capital case.  It explained, for example, that the prosecution may not 
diminish the jury’s sense of responsibility for its decision, may not make appeals 
based on race or religion, may not express personal views regarding the 
appropriateness of the death penalty, and must avoid inflammatory rhetoric.  The 
prosecutor opposed the motion.  Although he did not contest the principles of law 
outlined in the motion, he pointed out that whether a particular statement is 
misconduct may depend on the context in which it is made, and he urged the trial 
court not to make any ruling about misconduct in advance.  The court denied 
defendant’s motion, although it commented that the motion was a “useful 
document” that assisted both the court and the prosecutor by describing the 
applicable law.   
We conclude that defendant’s motion did not preserve his right to 
challenge, on appeal, the prosecutor’s comments in question.  As the prosecutor 
pointed out at trial, the remarks must be considered in context, and cannot be 
evaluated in advance.  In any event, the comments in question were not 
misconduct, as explained below. 
Defendant contends the prosecutor improperly appealed to the jury’s 
passion and prejudice when:  (1) he described the killings as “executions”; (2) he 
said that defendant “knows what it’s like to shoot somebody and to see them go 
down . . . [,] what it’s like to see . . . blood[, and] what kind of noises they make 
 60
before they die”; (3) he argued that defendant took the victims’ lives “in a manner 
that is obscene”; and (4) he asked the jury to show defendant “the same mercy he 
showed each of his victims.”  We disagree.  “Unlike the guilt determination, where 
appeals to the jury’s passions are inappropriate, in making the penalty decision, 
the jury must make a moral assessment of all the relevant facts as they reflect on 
its decision.  [Citations.]  Emotion must not reign over reason and, on objection, 
courts should guard against prejudicially emotional argument.  [Citation.]  But 
emotion need not, indeed, cannot, be entirely excluded from the jury’s moral 
assessment.”  (People v. Smith (2003) 30 Cal.4th 581, 634.)  Here the prosecutor’s 
comments were emotional, but not excessively so.  They were based on the 
evidence and fell within the permissible bounds of argument.  (See People 
v. Harrison (2005) 35 Cal.4th 208, 259; People v. Hughes (2002) 27 Cal.4th 287, 
395; People v. Ochoa, supra, 19 Cal.4th at pp. 464-465; People v. Haskett (1982) 
30 Cal.3d 841, 863-864.) 
Defendant challenges the prosecutor’s argument that if sentenced to life 
without possibility of parole, defendant would have a relatively pleasant life in 
prison, during which he could further his education, pursue crafts and hobbies, and 
watch television.  This argument was a reasonable commentary on the evidence.  
Although we have held that a trial court may exclude evidence of the conditions of 
confinement that a defendant will experience if sentenced to life imprisonment 
without parole because it is “irrelevant to the jury’s penalty determination” 
(People v. Quartermain (1997) 16 Cal.4th 600, 632), here the trial court permitted 
the defense to present such evidence.  A defense witness, a retired prison 
administrator, described the conditions experienced by inmates sentenced to life 
imprisonment without possibility of parole and said defendant would adjust well if 
he received such a sentence.  Once this evidence was admitted, the prosecutor was 
entitled to comment on it. 
 61
In his closing argument, the prosecutor reminded the jury that the cousin of 
murder victim Zeid Obeid felt guilty because the last time he saw Obeid they 
quarreled about Obeid’s job at Quik Stop (which the cousin presciently believed to 
be dangerous), and the argument ended with the cousin telling Obeid he hoped 
something bad would happen to him.  He also reminded the jury that Obeid’s body 
could not be returned to his parents’ home in Kuwait for burial, and he had to be 
buried in Lebanon.  (Although Obeid had lived almost his entire life in Kuwait, he 
was a citizen of Lebanon, and the Kuwaiti government refused the family’s 
request for permission to bury the body in Kuwait because his residence permit 
had expired.)  Defendant argues that these comments, and other similar references 
made by the prosecutor to the suffering experienced by the victims’ families, were 
inflammatory and improper because they referred to circumstances beyond 
defendant’s control.   
We disagree.  The evidence that close friends and relatives of the victims 
suffered emotional trauma as a result of their deaths was permissible victim impact 
testimony, and the prosecutor appropriately commented on it in his closing 
argument.  (People v. Panah, supra, 35 Cal.4th at pp. 494-495; People 
v. Benavides (2005) 35 Cal.4th 69, 107.)  The evidence that Obeid’s family was 
unable to return his body to Beirut for burial was admitted without objection.  Had 
an objection been made, the court would have determined the admissibility of the 
evidence.  (See generally People v. Harris (2005) 37 Cal.4th 310, 352.)  Once that 
evidence was admitted the prosecutor was entitled to discuss it in his closing 
argument.  There was no misconduct.   
Finally, defendant accuses the prosecutor of trying to exploit the 
circumstance that the jury was beginning its deliberations five days before 
Christmas by pointing out to the jury that the pain felt by members of the victims’ 
families would continue long after Christmas.  We find no improper exploitation.  
 62
Apparently concerned that the imminence of Christmas might influence the jury to 
spare defendant’s life, the prosecutor urged the jury “not to be swayed by 
emotional buzz words [pertaining to the holiday], but to consider the evidence, 
give it the weight that you find it’s entitled to, and make this appropriate 
decision.”  He noted that the holiday season was for most people “a very joyous 
time of the year,” but that it was a time of sorrow not only for defendant’s family 
but also for the victims’ families.   
C.  Alleged Instructional Error  
Defendant contends the trial court erred when it refused to give his two 
proposed instructions telling the jury it could consider sympathy or compassion 
for him.9  We disagree.  These instructions were unnecessary because the trial 
court instructed the jury that at the penalty phase of trial, unlike the guilt phase, 
“the law permits your verdict to be influenced by a variety of matters, including 
sympathy and compassion.”  Although defendant claims this instruction was 
inadequate because the jury might have construed it as meaning that the jury could 
consider sympathy for the victims’ families rather than for defendant, the 
                                              
9  
The first proposed instruction stated:  “Sympathy is not itself a mitigating 
‘factor’ or ‘circumstance,’ but an emotion.  Recognition that a jury’s exercise of 
sentencing discretion in a capital case may be influenced by a sympathetic 
response to mitigating evidence is entirely consistent with that observation.  The 
jury is permitted to consider mitigating evidence relating to the defendant’s 
character and background, whether or not related to the offense for which he is on 
trial, precisely because that evidence may arouse ‘sympathy’ or ‘compassion’ for 
the defendant.”   
 
The second proposed instruction stated:  “If a mitigating circumstance or an 
aspect of the defendant’s background or his character called to the attention of the 
jury by the evidence or its observation of the defendant arouses mercy, sympathy, 
empathy, or compassion such as to persuade you that death is not the appropriate 
penalty, you may act in response thereto and impose a sentence of life without 
possibility of parole.”   
 63
prosecutor repeatedly acknowledged in his closing argument that the instruction 
permitted the jury to consider sympathy for the defendant.  Defendant contends 
that one of his proposed instructions was superior to the one given by the court 
because, unlike the court’s instruction, it stated the jury could base its sympathy 
for defendant on observations of him in court.  (See People v. Lanphear (1984) 36 
Cal.3d 163, 167 [sympathy for defendant may be based on jury’s in-court 
observations].)  But nothing in the trial court’s instruction precluded the jury from 
basing its sympathetic feelings on its observations of defendant, and we see no 
need for an instruction expressly telling the jury it may do so. 
D.  Alleged Jury Misconduct  
As mentioned earlier, after the trial defendant filed a new trial motion 
asserting that several jurors committed misconduct during the deliberations at both 
the guilt and the penalty phases of trial.  The trial court denied the motion.  In part 
III. G. ante, we rejected defendant’s contention that prejudicial jury misconduct 
occurred at the guilt phase.  We now reject defendant’s claim that jury misconduct 
at the penalty phase of trial requires reversal of the judgment of death.   
1.  Refusal to deliberate 
In defendant’s new trial motion, he submitted four declarations stating that 
Juror 8’s behavior during deliberations at the penalty phase was similar to his 
conduct during the guilt phase deliberations:  At the start of the penalty phase 
deliberations, he announced his decision that defendant should get the death 
penalty, and he thereafter retreated to a corner, where he read a book as the other 
jurors deliberated.   
Defendant argues that Juror 8’s failure to deliberate requires reversal of the 
penalty phase verdict.  For reasons similar to those explained in part III. G. 1., 
ante, Juror 8’s refusal to deliberate did not prejudice defendant.  In Juror 8’s view, 
 64
death was so clearly the appropriate penalty that he saw no point in discussing the 
issue.  It did not take long for the other 11 jurors to reach the same conclusion, 
after deliberations that lasted approximately one day.  Thus, it appears that none of 
the jurors regarded the question of penalty as close and difficult, and we see no 
reasonable possibility that the jury would have reached a different result if Juror 8 
had participated in the deliberations. 
2.  False answers on voir dire 
Defendant contends that Juror 7 committed misconduct because he failed to 
disclose that he would automatically vote for the death penalty for any defendant 
convicted of first degree murder or of killing more than one person. 
On the juror questionnaire, in response to the question whether his feelings 
about the death penalty were so strong that he would “always” vote to impose it on 
a defendant convicted of first degree murder or would “never” vote to do so, Juror 
7 checked the line stating “neither of the above,” and wrote, “Never say Always 
Never say Never.”  In response to the question, “Do you think anyone convicted 
of murdering more than one person should receive the death penalty?,” Juror 7 
checked “yes,” and wrote, “Prevention of their ever killing again.”  Questioned 
later on voir dire regarding these responses, he explained:  “I would come [to the 
penalty phase] with a Zen mind.  I would come with a blank slate, saying ‘okay, 
talk me into it or out of it.’ ”   
Defendant’s motion for new trial included a declaration from Juror 3 
stating:  “During penalty phase deliberations, juror number 7 refused to consider 
any of the mitigating evidence which was raised by other jurors.  Juror #7 
response to each and every piece of evidence presented was ‘it doesn’t matter, he 
killed six people.’  I asked Juror #7 if he would always vote for the death penalty 
when  
 65
someone was convicted of killing six people, regardless of the mitigating 
circumstances.  Juror #7 responded that he would; and added that he would also 
always vote for the death penalty even if there was only one victim.  Juror #7 said 
that anyone who kills another person should get the death penalty.” 
Also attached to the new trial motion was a questionnaire the defense had 
sent to Juror 7 after the trial.  When asked whether he had decided on defendant’s 
punishment after hearing the evidence and arguments, but before deliberations 
began, Juror 7 answered “yes.”  The most important factor leading to his penalty 
decision, Juror 7 stated, was “six dead people.”  Asked to name the dispositive 
aggravating factors, Juror 7 responded, “corpus delicti.”   
Juror 7’s answers to the last five questions on the postconviction 
questionnaire were written in Latin.  When he was asked his opinion of the 
prosecutor, he responded “macte virtute.”  His opinion of lead defense counsel 
was “quare verum/bonis nocet quisquis pepercerit malis,” his opinion of backup 
counsel was “ad meliora vertamur,” and his opinion of defendant was “hoc habet.”  
In response to the question whether there was anything else defense counsel 
should know, he wrote, “hominis est errare insipientis perseverare[;] hic fumis 
nihil attraxit.”10 
                                              
10  
At the hearing on the motion for new trial, Juror 7 translated his answers, 
and the parties agree that his translations are accurate as to four of the questions.  
His opinion of the prosecutor:  “Well done.”  Of lead defense counsel:  “Seek the 
truth, whomever spares the wicked harms the good.”  Of backup counsel:  “Let’s 
turn to better things.”  Of defendant:  “He’s had it.”   
 
The translation of Juror 7’s answer to the last question is uncertain.  Juror 7 
testified it meant “once is enough.”  The trial court’s staff translated it as:  “It is 
human to err, for the one who is beginning to persevere the rope would not drag 
him down.  (The hangman’s rope).”  Defendant asserts that the answer consists of 
two Latin maxims:  “To err is human, but it is foolish to persist” and “This line (or 
rope) has dragged in nothing.”  The latter phrase, he explains, was originally 
 
(Footnote continued on next page.) 
 66
The trial court held an evidentiary hearing on the allegations pertaining to 
Juror 7.  At the hearing, Juror 3’s testimony was similar to, though slightly 
different from, his declaration.  He said that “three or four times” Juror 7 said 
defendant’s mitigating evidence “doesn’t matter much” because defendant “killed 
six people.”  He said he had asked Juror 7 if he would always vote for death if the 
defendant was convicted of killing six people, and that Juror 7 had replied:  “No, 
not six people.  He would do it for just one, even if one person was murdered.”   
Juror 7 testified that his voir dire answers were accurate.  In his initial 
testimony pertaining to the allegations of misconduct, on Friday, May 3, 1996, he 
denied making the statements attributed to him by Juror 3.  The next Monday, 
Juror 7 called the trial court and said he had some additional information 
pertaining to the new trial motion.  The court told him that any information should 
be given on the witness stand, and asked him to return that afternoon.  He then 
testified that during deliberations he had an argument with another juror.  During 
the argument, the question arose whether Juror 7 would vote to impose the death 
penalty on a defendant who killed only once.  Juror 7 said he “could give someone 
the death penalty if they only had cold-bloodedly, premeditatedly killed one 
person” (italics added), but he did not say he would automatically do so.   
The trial court found no misconduct by Juror 7.  Although the court 
described the juror as “very offensive” and characterized some of his testimony at 
the hearing on defendant’s new trial motion as “appalling,” it concluded that Juror 
                                                                                                                                      
 
 
(Footnote continued from previous page.) 
 
generally used in reference to fishing, and the answer as a whole expresses Juror 
7’s view that the postconviction questionnaire was a waste of time.  The Attorney 
General does not discuss the meaning of the answer, and we assume for the sake 
of argument that defendant’s translation is accurate.   
 67
7 “fully, honestly, and accurately disclosed his basic support for the death penalty 
in his original questionnaire,” and that it was not “reasonably probable that Juror 
Number Seven had prejudged the penalty phase in this case.”   
Defendant argues strenuously that Juror 7 lied when he testified on voir 
dire that he had an open mind and would not vote automatically to impose the 
death penalty, regardless of the mitigating evidence.  In reviewing the trial court’s 
ruling on this matter, “[w]e accept the trial court’s credibility determinations and 
findings on questions of historical fact if supported by substantial evidence.”  
(People v. Nesler, supra, 16 Cal.4th at p. 582.)  Here, Juror 7 credibly testified at 
the posttrial hearing that his answers on voir dire were truthful.  Based on that 
testimony, substantial evidence supports the trial court’s ruling that Juror 7 did not 
prejudge the case. 
Defendant faults the trial court for its refusal to decide whether Juror 7 or 
Juror 3 had accurately described the argument between them, contending that if 
the court had any doubt on the matter it should have summoned other jurors to 
testify.  He relies on a federal decision holding that when, in the middle of trial, a 
question arises about the partiality of one of the jurors, the trial court has “an 
independent responsibility to satisfy himself that the allegation of bias is 
unfounded.”  (Dyer v. Calderon (9th Cir. 1998) 151 F.3d 970, 978.)  Here, 
however, the allegation of juror bias occurred not in the middle of trial, but at a 
hearing after trial.  We need not decide here whether, as a general rule, a trial court 
has an independent responsibility to investigate allegations of juror misconduct at 
a posttrial hearing, because here no further investigation was warranted.  The 
pertinent issue at the hearing was not what Juror 7 and Juror 3 said in the heat of 
deliberations, but whether Juror 7 had lied at voir dire and was biased against 
defendant.  The trial court believed Juror 7’s posttrial testimony that he had 
testified truthfully on voir dire and that he had not prejudged the case, and the 
 68
court added that its view would not be affected by ascertaining what exactly Jurors 
3 and 7 had said to each other.  We agree with this assessment. 
3.  Discussion of defendant’s failure to testify at the penalty phase 
The trial court instructed the jury that defendant had a right not to testify at 
the penalty phase, that the jury should draw no inferences from a failure to do so, 
and that the jury should not discuss the matter or allow it to influence the jury’s 
deliberations in any way.  Nevertheless, according to two juror affidavits 
presented by defendant in support of his new trial motion, the jury discussed 
defendant’s failure to testify during its deliberations.  Juror 5 declared:  “During 
penalty phase deliberations, several jurors, myself included, expressed the opinion 
that we would have liked for [defendant] to testify during the penalty phase so that 
we could better understand why he killed six people, and whether he was truly 
remorseful.”  Juror 12, the foreperson, declared:  “During the penalty phase 
deliberations, jurors, myself included, discussed the fact that we would like to 
have heard [defendant] testify during the penalty phase so that we could better 
know him and understand the extent of his impairment.  We discussed the fact that 
we would have liked to have heard [defendant’s] reasons for committing the 
crimes as we felt this was not satisfactorily answered through the testimony of 
defense expert witnesses.”   
Defendant contends that by discussing his failure to testify at the penalty 
phase, the jury committed prejudicial misconduct.  We disagree. 
The Fifth Amendment to the federal Constitution provides that no person 
“shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself.”  A 
defendant may invoke this right at the penalty phase of a capital case, even though 
the risk of self-incrimination is diminished because the defendant has already been 
convicted.  (Estelle v. Smith (1981) 451 U.S. 454, 462-463; People v. Thompson 
 69
(1988) 45 Cal.3d 86, 124; People v. Melton (1988) 44 Cal.3d 713, 757.)  The right 
not to testify would be vitiated if the jury could draw adverse inferences from a 
defendant’s failure to testify.  Thus, the Fifth Amendment entitles a criminal 
defendant, upon request, to an instruction that will “minimize the danger that the 
jury will give evidentiary weight to a defendant’s failure to testify.”  (Carter v. 
Kentucky (1981) 450 U.S. 288, 305.) 
Here, by violating the trial court’s instruction not to discuss defendant’s 
failure to testify, the jury committed misconduct.  (People v. Hord (1993) 15 
Cal.App.4th 711, 721, 725; People v. Perez (1992) 4 Cal.App.4th 893, 908.)  This 
misconduct gives rise to a presumption of prejudice, which “may be rebutted . . . 
by a reviewing court’s determination, upon examining the entire record, that there 
is no substantial likelihood that the complaining party suffered actual harm.”  
(People v. Hardy (1992) 2 Cal.4th 86, 174; see People v. Danks (2004) 32 Cal.4th 
269, 303 [applying similar standard to allegations of juror bias]; People v. Nesler, 
supra, 16 Cal.4th at pp. 582-583 (lead opn.) [same].) 
At the hearing on defendant’s motion for a new trial, the trial court 
acknowledged that misconduct had occurred, but it ruled that defendant was not 
prejudiced by the juror comments on his failure to testify.  In reviewing this 
ruling, we apply our independent judgment.  (People v. Danks, supra, 32 Cal.4th 
at p. 303 [“ ‘Whether prejudice arose from juror misconduct . . . is a mixed 
question of law and fact subject to an appellate court’s independent 
determination.’ ”].)  Applying that standard, we agree with the trial court here that 
the jury’s references to defendant’s failure to testify did not prejudice defendant.   
As mentioned earlier, the purpose of the rule prohibiting jury discussion of 
a defendant’s failure to testify is to prevent the jury from drawing adverse 
inferences against the defendant, in violation of the constitutional right not to 
incriminate oneself.  Here, the comments on defendant’s failure to testify 
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mentioned in defendant’s new trial motion merely expressed regret that defendant 
had not testified, because such testimony might have assisted the jurors in 
understanding him better.  In the words of the trial court:  “I think that wanting to 
hear defendants testify is natural.  We do the best we can to deter jurors from 
speculating and from drawing negative inferences, but merely referencing that 
they wish he would have testified is not the same as punishing the Defendant for 
not testifying.  It is not the same as drawing negative inferences from the absence 
of testimony.”  We conclude there is no substantial likelihood that defendant was 
prejudiced by the jury’s brief discussion of his failure to testify at the penalty 
phase. 
4.  Discussion of the possibility that defendant may never be executed 
According to declarations defendant submitted in support of his motion for 
a new trial, the jury during its deliberations discussed the length of the appeal 
process and the possibility that defendant may never be executed.  Defendant 
argues this discussion was misconduct because it diminished the jury’s sense of 
responsibility for its penalty decision.  (See Caldwell v. Mississippi, supra, 472 
U.S. 320, 330.)  We have in the past rejected similar contentions (People 
v. Majors (1998) 18 Cal.4th 385, 420-422; People v. Cox (1991) 53 Cal.3d 618, 
693-696; see also People v. Schmeck (2005) 37 Cal.4th 240, 307; People 
v. Mendoza (2000) 24 Cal.4th 130, 195), and we see no need to revisit the issue.  
Defendant also complains that, according to the foreperson’s posttrial 
declaration, some jurors “discussed the premise that keeping someone in prison for 
the rest of their life is more costly to taxpayers than sentencing him to death.”  The 
foreperson, however, reminded the jury “this was not an appropriate 
consideration” in determining whether to impose the death penalty.  Thus, 
assuming for the sake of argument that the jurors’ comments on this subject were 
 71
improper (see Spaziano v. Florida (1984) 468 U.S. 447, 461-462; People 
v. Thompson, supra, 45 Cal.3d at p. 132), the error was harmless. 
E.  Proportionality Review  
Defendant urges us to set aside his sentence of death because it is 
disproportionate to his individual culpability.   
We do not engage in intercase proportionality review.  (See, e.g., People 
v. Maury (2003) 30 Cal.4th 342, 441.)  But when, as here, the defendant so 
requests, we review the particular facts of a defendant’s case to determine whether 
the death sentence is so disproportionate to the defendant’s personal culpability as 
to violate the California Constitution’s prohibition against cruel or unusual 
punishment.  (See People v. Rogers (2006) 39 Cal.4th 826, 894; People v. Steele 
(2002) 27 Cal.4th 1230, 1269; People v. Dillon (1983) 34 Cal.3d 441, 478-489.)  
Although defendant also asserts that article 14 of the International Covenant on 
Civil and Political Rights entitles him to this review, we need not decide whether 
he is correct, because California law requires it. 
“To determine whether a sentence is cruel or unusual as applied to a 
particular defendant, a reviewing court must examine the circumstances of the 
offense, including its motive, the extent of the defendant’s involvement in the 
crime, the manner in which the crime was committed, and the consequences of the 
defendant’s acts.  The court must also consider the personal characteristics of the 
defendant, including age, prior criminality, and mental capabilities.  (People 
v. Dillon, supra, 34 Cal.3d at p. 479.)  If the court concludes that the penalty 
imposed is ‘grossly disproportionate to the defendant’s individual culpability’ 
(ibid.), or, stated another way, that the punishment ‘ “ ‘shocks the conscience and 
offends fundamental notions of human dignity’ ” ’ [citation], the court must 
 72
invalidate the sentence as unconstitutional.”  (People v. Hines (1997) 15 Cal.4th 
997, 1078.) 
In arguing that the death sentence is unconstitutional as applied to him, 
defendant stresses his youth (21 years old at the time of the murders), his low 
intelligence, his chronic and uncontrolled epilepsy, his brain damage, and his 
mental illness.  We acknowledge the seriousness of defendant’s disabilities, but 
nonetheless defendant committed two robberies during which he murdered six 
people by shooting them in the head, and to ensure the deaths of two of his victims 
he fired at close range, holding the gun less than two inches from their heads.  On 
these facts, the death sentence is not grossly disproportionate to defendant’s 
culpability. 
Defendant asks this court to invoke sections 1181 and 1260 to reduce his 
sentence to life imprisonment without possibility of parole.11  But under those 
sections, “we lack the power to overturn a judgment of death simply because we 
disagree with the jury’s penalty determination” (People v. Hines, supra, 15 Cal.4th 
                                              
11  
Section 1181 provides in relevant part:  “When a verdict has been rendered 
or a finding made against the defendant, the court may, upon his application, grant 
a new trial, in the following cases only:  [¶]  . . .  [¶]  7.  When the verdict or 
finding is contrary to law or evidence, but in any case wherein authority is vested 
by statute in the trial court or jury to recommend or determine as a part of its 
verdict or finding the punishment to be imposed, the court may modify such 
verdict or finding by imposing the lesser punishment without granting or ordering 
a new trial, and this power shall extend to any court to which the case may be 
appealed; . . .” 
 
Section 1260 states:  “The court may reverse, affirm, or modify a judgment 
or order appealed from, or reduce the degree of the offense or attempted offense or 
the punishment imposed, and may set aside, affirm, or modify any or all of the 
proceedings subsequent to, or dependent upon, such judgment or order, and may, 
if proper, order a new trial and may, if proper, remand the cause to the trial court 
for such further proceedings as may be just under the circumstances.” 
 73
at p. 1080), and we may only reverse the judgment if we find “prejudicial error or 
legal insufficiency of evidence” (ibid.).  Here we find neither. 
F.  Execution of Developmentally Disabled Defendant  
Defendant asserts his mental condition is “functionally indistinguishable 
from a mentally retarded individual,” and to execute him would violate the federal 
Constitution’s prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment, as contained in 
the Eighth Amendment, well as the corresponding provision in the California 
Constitution (Cal. Const., art. I, § 17). 
In Atkins v. Virginia (2002) 536 U.S. 304, the United States Supreme Court 
held that execution of the mentally retarded violates the Eighth Amendment.  But 
Atkins did not give a precise definition of mental retardation, and it left to the 
states the task of creating procedures to determine whether individuals facing 
execution are mentally retarded.  (Id. at p. 317.)  Thereafter, the California 
Legislature enacted section 1376, which establishes procedures for the 
determination of mental retardation in preconviction capital cases, and which 
defines mental retardation as “the condition of significantly subaverage general 
intellectual functioning existing concurrently with deficits in adaptive behavior 
and manifested before the age of 18.”  (Id., subd. (a).) 
According to defendant, the evidence presented at trial shows that he is 
functionally indistinguishable from a mentally retarded offender.  He points to 
testimony by defense experts that he has low intelligence, that he has an epileptic 
seizure disorder that has existed since he was a young child, and that this disorder 
has caused significant damage to his brain and will continue to do so in the future. 
Defendant’s argument appears to be based on this factual premise:  (1) he 
has “significantly subaverage general intellectual functioning existing 
concurrently with deficits in adaptive behavior” (§ 1376, subd. (a)); (2) this low 
 74
functioning results from a condition that was “manifested before the age of 18” 
(ibid.); but (3) the condition may not have caused him to become retarded before 
he became 18 (ibid.).  Thus, he argues, even if California’s definition of mental 
retardation requires that the defendant’s retardation occur before the age of 18 it 
would be unconstitutional to execute him merely because his retardation results 
from a condition that manifested itself before the age of 18 but did not cause him 
to become retarded until a later time.   
There is no need to decide the legal issue defendant raises – whether the 
state and federal Constitutions prohibit the execution of a defendant who becomes 
retarded after age 18 as the result of a physical condition that existed before age 18 
– because the factual prerequisites underlying that issue have not been litigated.  
That is, the trial in this case did not determine the extent of defendant’s current 
mental impairment, or when he became mentally impaired.  As a result, those 
factual questions cannot be decided on this direct appeal; they can be determined 
only in a habeas corpus petition alleging, based on defendant’s mental condition, 
that it would be unconstitutional to execute him.  We therefore reject defendant’s 
contention without prejudice to the filing of such a petition. 
G.  Challenges to California’s Death Penalty Law  
Defendant contends California’s death penalty law violates the federal 
Constitution in many respects.  We have in the past rejected all of these claims, 
and we reject his invitation to revisit them.  Briefly:   
(1)  California’s death penalty law adequately narrows the class of 
murderers eligible for the death penalty.  (People v. Demetrulias (2006) 39 Cal.4th 
1, 43.) 
(2)  Factor (a) of section 190.3, which permits the jury to consider the 
“circumstances of the crime” in determining whether to impose the death penalty, 
 75
is not unconstitutionally vague, arbitrary, or capricious.  (Tuilaepa v. California 
(1994) 512 U.S. 967, 975-980; People v. Avila, supra, 38 Cal.4th 491, 614.) 
(3)  The federal and state Constitutions as well as recent decisions of the 
United States Supreme Court do not require that the jury must apply a beyond a 
reasonable doubt standard when determining the truth of aggravating factors, that 
the jury may not impose the death penalty unless it finds beyond a reasonable 
doubt that the circumstances in aggravation outweigh those in mitigation, or that 
the jury must unanimously agree on the presence of a particular aggravating 
factor.  (People v. Boyer (2006) 38 Cal.4th 412, 485; People v. Blair (2005) 36 
Cal.4th 686, 753.) 
(4)  Neither the federal Constitution nor section 520 of the Evidence Code 
requires that the jury be instructed that the prosecution has the burden of proof 
with regard to the truth of aggravating circumstances or the appropriateness of the 
death penalty, and the trial court is not required to explicitly tell the jury that 
neither party bears the burden of proof.  (People v. Dunkle (2005) 36 Cal.4th 861, 
939.) 
(5)  The federal Constitution does not require the jury to make written 
findings regarding aggravating factors.  (People v. Demetrulias, supra, 39 Cal.4th 
at p. 43.) 
(6)  This court’s refusal to conduct intercase proportionality review of a 
death sentence does not violate the federal Constitution.  (People v. Demetrulias, 
supra, 39 Cal.4th at p. 44.) 
(7)  The adjectives “extreme” and “substantial” in statutory mitigating 
factors (d) and (g) of section 190.3 do not prevent the jury from considering 
mitigating evidence.  (People v. Boyer, supra, 38 Cal.4th at p. 484.) 
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(8)  The trial court is not required to instruct the jury that statutory factors 
(d), (e), (f), (g), (h), and (j) in section 190.3 are relevant only as mitigating factors, 
not as aggravating factors.  (People v. Gray (2005) 37 Cal.4th 168, 236.)  
(9)  California’s death penalty law does not violate the equal protection 
clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the federal Constitution because the 
sentencing procedures for capital defendants are different from those for 
noncapital defendants.  (People v. Blair, supra, 36 Cal.4th at p. 754.) 
(10)  California’s use of the death penalty, which defendant alleges to be a 
“regular form of punishment,” does not violate the Eighth and Fourteenth 
Amendments to the federal Constitution by violating what defendant describes as 
“international norms of humanity and decency,” nor does it violate principles of 
international law.  (People v. Blair, supra, 36 Cal.4th at pp. 754-755.) 
Defendant asserts that many of the claimed errors he has asserted violate 
the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, the American Declaration 
of the Rights and Duties of Man, the American Convention on Human Rights, the 
European Convention, and the Body of Principles for the Protection of All Persons 
under Any Form of Detention or Imprisonment adopted by the United Nations.  
Assuming for the sake of argument that these claims can be raised for the first time 
on appeal, and assuming for the sake of argument that these claims would, if 
meritorious, require reversal of defendant’s murder convictions or sentence of 
death, the claims lack merit for the reasons we have discussed earlier.  Defendant 
makes no showing that his rights under any of these agreements exceed those 
provided under California law. 
Finally, defendant appears to argue that under principles of international 
law he cannot be executed because he has become insane since being sentenced to 
death.  We need not decide whether international law prohibits the execution of 
persons who have become insane, because execution of the insane is prohibited by 
 77
the federal Constitution and by California law.  (Ford v. Wainwright (1986) 477 
U.S. 399; People v. Kelly (1992) 1 Cal.4th 495, 544; § 3700.5 et. seq.)  But the 
question whether a defendant is mentally competent to be executed is not 
determined until the defendant’s execution date has been set.  (§ 3700.5.)  No date 
has been set for defendant’s execution.  Thus, his claim that he cannot be executed 
because he is insane is rejected as premature.  (See Kelly, supra, at p. 545, fn. 11.) 
H.  Cumulative Error  
Defendant contends the cumulative impact of all of the errors at the guilt 
and penalty phases of trial require reversal of the judgment death.  Considered 
cumulatively, the few errors we have identified do not require reversal. 
DISPOSITION 
We affirm the judgment in its entirety. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
KENNARD, J. 
WE CONCUR: 
 
GEORGE, C. J. 
BAXTER, J. 
WERDEGAR, J. 
CHIN, J. 
MORENO, J. 
CORRIGAN, J. 
 
 
See next page for addresses and telephone numbers for counsel who argued in Supreme Court. 
 
Name of Opinion People v. Leonard 
__________________________________________________________________________________ 
 
Unpublished Opinion 
Original Appeal XXX 
Original Proceeding 
Review Granted 
Rehearing Granted 
 
__________________________________________________________________________________ 
 
Opinion No. S054291 
Date Filed: May 17, 2007 
__________________________________________________________________________________ 
 
Court: Superior 
County: Sacramento 
Judge: Thomas M. Cecil 
 
__________________________________________________________________________________ 
 
Attorneys for Appellant: 
 
Wesley A. Van Winkle, under appointment by the Supreme Court, for Defendant and Appellant. 
 
 
 
 
__________________________________________________________________________________ 
 
Attorneys for Respondent: 
 
Bill Lockyer and Edmund G. Brown, Jr., Attorneys General, Robert R. Anderson, Chief Assistant Attorney 
General, Mary Jo Graves, Assistant Attorney General, Ward A. Campbell and Patricia J. Whalen, Deputy 
Attorneys General, for Plaintiff and Respondent. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Counsel who argued in Supreme Court (not intended for publication with opinion): 
 
Wesley A. Van Winkle 
P.O. Box 5216 
Berkeley, CA  94705-0216 
(510) 848-6250 
 
Patrick J. Whalen 
Deputy Attorney General 
1300 I Street 
Sacramento, CA  94244-2550 
(916) 324-2785