Opinion ID: 2631807
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Attacking defense counsel

Text: Defendant also complains that the prosecutor implied that defense lawyers generally use various tricks and moves to try to win their cases by confusing the witnesses. The matter arose after Kazumi testified that he remembered Deputy District Attorney Bryan Brown representing the prosecution at the preliminary examination. Counsel for codefendant Scheid, evidently hoping to cast some doubt on Kazumi's ability to remember such details, called Chief Deputy District Attorney James Enright to testify that he, and not Brown, was the prosecutor at defendant's preliminary examination. On cross-examining Enright, the prosecutor asked if he was familiar with some of the tricks used by criminal defense lawyers. The court sustained a codefendant's objection to the word tricks, but allowed the prosecutor to inquire whether Enright had ever seen similar defense moves used on a hypothetical witness who testified for hours from a wheelchair and suffered from pain, and who was then asked to remember who had prosecuted the preliminary examination. After the court overruled a codefendant's objection, Enright replied, That's a new one, and the matter was dropped. During closing arguments, however, the prosecutor continued with this theme, observing that codefendants' counsel had used all their tricks to confuse Kazumi in his vulnerable state. Defendant now argues the prosecutor's remarks constituted an attack on the credibility and integrity of defense lawyers generally (see People v. Welch (1999) 20 Cal.4th 701, 752-753, 85 Cal.Rptr.2d 203, 976 P.2d 754; United States v. Boldt (1st Cir.1991) 929 F.2d 35, 40-41), coupled with an improper inflammatory reference to the surviving victim's pain and suffering. The Attorney General responds that the references to defense lawyers' tactics and to Kazumi's physical state were fair comments on the evidence not reaching the level of misconduct. Although we agree no misconduct occurred, we doubt the prosecutor's inquiry regarding defense moves in other cases was relevant to the issues, a contention not raised in this appeal. Defendant's prosecutorial misconduct argument is similar to one we rejected in People v. Medina (1995) 11 Cal.4th 694, 759, 47 Cal.Rptr.2d 165, 906 P.2d 2, where we stated: Finally, defendant contends the prosecutor demeaned defense counsel's integrity by observing that `any experienced defense attorney can twist a little, poke a little, try to draw some speculation, try to get you to buy something ....' In our view, the prosecutor's foregoing argument was unobjectionable. To observe that an experienced defense counsel will attempt to `twist' and `poke' at the prosecution's case does not amount to a personal attack on counsel's integrity. [Citations.] We think the prosecutor's comments in the present case, referring to defense tricks or moves used to demonstrate a witness's confusion or uncertainty, fall within the same category as that in Medina, involving no improper personal attack on defense counsel's integrity. We observe that, with the exception of People v. Hill (1998) 17 Cal.4th 800, 72 Cal.Rptr.2d 656, 952 P.2d 673, involving pervasive and egregious prosecutorial misconduct affecting all phases of trial, none of the personal attack cases cited by defendant found reversible misconduct. As for the prosecutor's references to Kazumi's suffering, we find no improper attempt to place victim impact evidence before the jury. In context, we think the prosecutor was merely calling the jury's attention to the fact that Kazumi's physical state naturally made him susceptible to minor mistakes in his testimony, such as failing to recall which person conducted a particular preliminary examination. Moreover, the jury was well aware, from the other testimony in the case, that Kazumi suffered from severe paralysis and pain. Any prosecutorial disclosure of the impact of defendant's assault on Kazumi was entirely cumulative to other evidence in the case.