Opinion ID: 2594480
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 18

Heading: Cross-examination of Ernest Ramos

Text: Defendant next asserts prosecutorial misconduct based on the cross-examination of defense witness Ernest Ramos. On direct examination, defense counsel asked Ramos whether, when Ramos last saw defendant at 11:30 p.m. on the night of the murders, defendant looked as if he had been smoking rock, meaning cocaine. Ramos answered no, but when the question was repeated he answered yes. During cross-examination, the prosecution pointed out this equivocation and asked: You don't want to just give the answers that he wants, do you? Defendant asserts this question constituted misconduct because it suggested, without foundation, the witness had lied to protect defendant. Defendant did not object to this question in the trial court, and therefore he forfeited the issue. ( People v. Williams, supra, 16 Cal.4th at pp. 208-209, 66 Cal.Rptr.2d 123, 940 P.2d 710.) Moreover, any misconduct associated with this question could not have prejudiced defendant. The question called into doubt Ramos's testimony that shortly before the murders defendant looked as if he had smoked cocaine. But even if the jury improperly discredited Ramos's testimony on this point, it is not reasonably probable that a result more favorable [to defendant] would have been reached in the absence of this error. ( People v. Watson (1956) 46 Cal.2d 818, 836, 299 P.2d 243.) In addition to Ramos's testimony, defendant presented significant other evidence of his intoxication during the evening before the murders, but the jury nevertheless rejected his intoxication defense. The prosecutor also asked Ramos whether defendant sold a videocassette recorder during the day before the murders in order to purchase cocaine. The prosecutor repeated the question and also asked what defendant had said to Ramos's brother. Ramos answered in each case that he did not know. Later, the prosecutor asked Ramos whether defendant had told him on the day before the murders that Converse had guns in her apartment, to which Ramos answered no, and whether guns could be easily traded for cocaine, to which Ramos answered yes. Defendant argues that this questioning was misconduct because the prosecutor had no evidentiary basis for the questions and the questions planted in the minds of the jurors the unsubstantiated idea that defendant sold Converse's videocassette recorder in order to buy cocaine and then later reentered her apartment in order to steal her rifles and trade them for more cocaine. We find no misconduct. Defendant had previously elicited Ramos's testimony that rock cocaine was sold in the alley behind defendant's apartment complex. The prosecutor was entitled, under the circumstances, to inquire further into this matter. (See, e.g., People v. Steele, supra, 27 Cal.4th at pp. 1247-1249, 120 Cal.Rptr.2d 432, 47 P.3d 225; People v. Clark, supra, 5 Cal.4th at p. 1016, 22 Cal.Rptr.2d 689, 857 P.2d 1099.)