Opinion ID: 1801948
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Failure to define reasonable doubt

Text: At the conclusion of the penalty phase evidence, the trial court instructed the jury using the 1989 version of CALJIC No. 8.84.1 in pertinent part as follows: You will now be instructed as to all of the law that applies to the penalty phase of this trial. [¶] You must determine what the facts are from the evidence received during the entire trial unless you are instructed to the contrary or otherwise. You must accept and follow the law that I shall state to you. You are to disregard all other instructions given to you in other phases of this trial.  The trial court also instructed the jury, as pertinent here, in the language of CALJIC No. 8.84, the introductory penalty phase instruction; No. 8.85, the list of aggravating and mitigating factors for the jury's consideration; No. 8.86, requiring proof of a prior conviction beyond a reasonable doubt; No. 8.87, requiring proof of other criminal activity beyond a reasonable doubt; No. 8.88, the penalty phase concluding instruction, and defendant's special instruction No. 26. [32] Contrary to the recommendation in the Use Note to CALJIC No. 8.84.1, however, the trial court did not reinstruct the jury with CALJIC No. 2.90, defining reasonable doubt. Defendant asserts that the failure to redefine reasonable doubt violated state law as well as his rights to due process of law and a reliable penalty determination under the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution. (31) The omission was error. As we recently explained in addressing a similar claim, if a trial court instructs the jury at the penalty phase not to refer to instructions given at the guilt phase, it later must provide the jury with those instructions applicable to the evaluation of evidence at the penalty phase, including CALJIC No. 2.90. ( People v. Lewis, supra, 43 Cal.4th at p. 535; accord, People v. Chatman (2006) 38 Cal.4th 344, 408 [42 Cal.Rptr.3d 621, 133 P.3d 534].) As in Lewis, however, we find the error here harmless under either the state reasonable possibility standard for penalty phase error (see People v. Brown, supra, 46 Cal.3d at pp. 446-448), or the harmless beyond a reasonable doubt standard for federal constitutional error set forth in Chapman v. California, supra, 386 U.S. at page 24. ( People v. Lewis, supra, 43 Cal.4th at p. 535.) Defendant speculates that in the absence of an instruction defining reasonable doubt, and in light of the instruction to disregard the guilt phase instructions, individual jurors likely applied legally incorrect and possibly inconsistent standards of proof to the evidence of unadjudicated criminal activity. But as defendant acknowledges, the jury was instructed that before it could consider unadjudicated criminal activity as aggravating, it had to find beyond a reasonable doubt that defendant had engaged in that activity. There is no reasonable possibility the jury would have believed that the reasonable doubt standard it was required to apply at the penalty phase was any different than the standard it had just applied at the guilt phase . . ., under which at least three and possibly nine jurors had found defendant's guilt of the Russell murder had not been proved beyond a reasonable doubt. ( People v. Lewis, supra, 43 Cal.4th at p. 536; see People v. Chatman, supra, 38 Cal.4th at p. 408.) Defendant points out that penalty phase deliberations began six days after guilt phase deliberations ended, and speculates that the jurors may have forgotten the definition within that timeframe. We find that possibility unrealistic, given that the question whether defendant's guilt of Russell's murder had been proved beyond a reasonable doubt evidently was hotly disputed, and the jurors were emphatic and adamant in their views. (Cf. People v. Rogers, supra, 39 Cal.4th at p. 905 [no reasonable possibility jury forgot reasonable doubt instruction given two weeks earlier].) Moreover, nothing in the record suggests the absence of an instruction defining reasonable doubt caused the jurors to apply a legally incorrect standard or inconsistent standards. Nothing in counsel's closing arguments suggested that anything other than the definition given at the guilt phase applied, and the jurors did not ask any questions or request clarification of the reasonable doubt concept. (See People v. Lewis, supra, 43 Cal.4th at p. 535; People v. Chatman, supra, 38 Cal.4th at p. 408.) Finally, defendant stipulated that he committed the offenses against James Foster and Jessie Cruz. Defendant disputed whether he had abused his girlfriend's son, and of course he disputed whether he had killed Russell. (Cf. People v. Lewis, supra, 43 Cal.4th at pp. 535-536.) However, in light of the considerations outlined above, the strength of the uncontroverted aggravating evidence, and the relative weakness of the case in mitigation, we find no reasonable possibility that the trial court's failure to redefine reasonable doubt affected the penalty verdict. The error was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt.