Opinion ID: 2633286
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Sympathetic Factors

Text: At the modification hearing, counsel summarized the testimony of the penalty phase witnesses who testified to defendant's good deeds in Guatemala and urged the trial court to strike the death penalty based on this evidence alone. He also argued that defendant was a good member of his community when he was not intoxicated. The trial court found that the aggravating circumstances substantially outweighed the mitigating circumstances and rejected the automatic application for a reduction in sentence from death to life without the possibility of parole. Defendant contends that in deciding his verdict-modification application the trial court erred because it refused to consider sympathetic factors in mitigation. He specifically complains the court ignored the sympathetic value of the evidence of his good deeds and community involvement described above. Defendant cites as error the following statements by the trial court: So the logic of the setup of the statutory scheme plus the decisions of the Supreme Court lead me to the inescapable conclusion that a trial court does not assess whether [the death penalty] was appropriate, that considerations of mercy and sympathy come into play in only two areas when a death penalty is involved. [¶] They are factors appropriate for the jury to consider, . . . and number two, of course, historically they continued to employ factors considered by the governor when it comes to his commutation powers. But they are not within the purview of the trial judge. As defendant correctly argues, we have recognized that sympathetic factors are integral to both the jury's penalty determination and the trial court's ruling on a motion for modification of the verdict. (See People v. Dyer (1988) 45 Cal.3d 26, 84, 246 Cal.Rptr. 209, 753 P.2d 1 [the court's comments reflected its understanding that it could properly consider sympathy in making its decision]; People v. Williams (1988) 44 Cal.3d 883, 971-972, 245 Cal.Rptr. 336, 751 P.2d 395 [the jury, and the judge in deciding whether to modify a verdict of death, must be permitted to consider any evidence that is relevant and potentially mitigating, including evidence that may reflect remorse, or otherwise arouse sympathy in either jury or judge].) But [s]ympathy is not itself a mitigating `factor' or `circumstance,' but an emotion. ( People v. Lanphear (1984) 36 Cal.3d 163, 166, 203 Cal.Rptr. 122, 680 P.2d 1081.) The trial court is not required to find that evidence offered in mitigation does in fact mitigate. ( People v. Scott, supra, 15 Cal.4th at p. 1222, 65 Cal.Rptr.2d 240, 939 P.2d 354.) Here, the record indicates the trial court painstakingly considered all of the evidence offered in aggravation and mitigation. It identified the evidence of defendant's good deeds in Guatemala, his intoxication on the day of the murder, and his lack of felony convictions as circumstances in mitigation it considered. The court specifically commented on the sympathetic value of the good deeds offered by defendant, although it found many of these deeds were not what it called altruistic in nature. The court then independently weighed the evidence of aggravating and mitigating circumstances and found, as stated above, the evidence of the aggravating circumstances substantially outweighed that of the mitigating circumstances. The court concluded the findings of the jury were appropriate based on the evidence presented. No more is required of the trial court. ( People v. Lang, supra, 49 Cal.3d at p. 1045, 264 Cal.Rptr. 386, 782 P.2d 627.) The trial court made the remarks about sympathy and mercy in the course of commenting that, after assessing whether the evidence of the aggravating circumstances outweighs that of the mitigating circumstances, a trial court does not itself, independently and de novo, determine that the death penalty is appropriate in a particular case. (See § 190.4, subd. (e); People v. Alvarez, supra, 14 Cal.4th at p. 245, 58 Cal.Rptr.2d 385, 926 P.2d 365.) Instead, as the trial court stated, its function in ruling on the verdict-modification application is to independently reweigh the aggravating and mitigating evidence and determine whether the evidence supports the jury's verdict. Its remarks concerning the mitigating evidence defendant offered reveal that it considered all such evidence although finding it worthy of little weight. The court's reference to mercy and sympathy not being within the purview of the trial judge are most reasonably understood as its declining to step outside the trial judge's proper role of independently reweighing evidence to substitute its own view of the appropriate penalty. It correctly stated that sympathetic factors may be considered by the jury in determining whether the death penalty is warranted (§ 190.3) and by the Governor in deciding whether to commute a sentence (Cal. Const., art. V, § 8).