Opinion ID: 2631807
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Ruling on Motion to Modify Verdict

Text: Defendant next claims the trial court denied his motion to modify the verdict (see § 190.4, subd. (e)) after hearing and considering some victim impact evidence that had not been presented to the jury. The record shows that the court presided over codefendant Scheid's sentencing hearing two weeks before ruling on defendant's modification motion. At the Scheid hearing, members of the Hanano family, including children June and Russell (who had not testified at defendant's trial), expressed their strong desire that all defendants receive maximum sentences. Additionally, at this hearing, the court considered Scheid's probation report, which likewise contained statements by the Hanano children not presented to defendant's jury. For example, as defendant observes, Kazumi stated at one point that he was ruining his sons' lives and that he would be better off dead. At defendant's own sentencing hearing, and before receiving testimony from the Hanano family, the court announced that it had denied the automatic motion to modify the sentence. This procedure was proper under our case law. ( People v. Kirkpatrick (1994) 7 Cal.4th 988, 1023, 30 Cal.Rptr.2d 818, 874 P.2d 248, and cases cited.) But defendant maintains the court's decision to deny modification was necessarily influenced by the victim impact evidence it previously heard at the earlier Scheid hearing. A trial judge is inevitably exposed to a plethora of inadmissible, even highly inflammatory, evidence during the course of trial. Yet, in the absence of contrary evidence, we may presume that such exposure played no role in the court's ultimate decisions. (E.g., People v. Champion (1995) 9 Cal.4th 879, 951, 39 Cal.Rptr.2d 547, 891 P.2d 93, and cases cited; see 9 Witkin, Cal. Procedure (4th ed. 1997) Appeal, § 414, pp. 464-465, and cases cited.) This presumption would be especially valid when, as here, the evidence at issue was relevant to, and properly received in the course of, sentencing another codefendant. We presume the trial court's training and experience enabled it to confine its consideration of such evidence to the case in which it was properly admitted. Defendant cites nothing in the record indicating the court actually relied on any inadmissible evidence in making its decision to deny modification. (See People v. Memro (1995) 11 Cal.4th 786, 886, 47 Cal.Rptr.2d 219, 905 P.2d 1305; People v. Lewis (1990) 50 Cal.3d 262, 286-287, 266 Cal.Rptr. 834, 786 P.2d 892.) The court's statement cited only facts and circumstances properly elicited at defendant's trial. We conclude that defendant has failed to show the court relied on inadmissible evidence in denying his modification motion.