Opinion ID: 2639471
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 7

Heading: Jury's Request

Text: During deliberations, the jury requested a copy of Dr. Edwards's report. This report was referred to in the testimony of Dr. Globus, a defense psychologist. The trial court correctly informed the jury that, because the report was not in evidence, it was not available to the jury. The court volunteered that the jury could have the court reporter read back Dr. Globus's entire testimony, but not only the aspects that related to the report. The jury was given the night to reflect upon this situation. The next morning, the jury did not renew its request. Instead, it resumed deliberations and returned a death verdict later that day. We have interpreted Penal Code section 1138 to provide that `the trial court must satisfy requests by the jury for rereading of testimony.' ( People v. Box (2000) 23 Cal.4th 1153, 1213, 99 Cal.Rptr.2d 69, 5 P.3d 130, quoting People v. Ainsworth (1988) 45 Cal.3d 984, 1020, 248 Cal.Rptr. 568, 755 P.2d 1017.) [7] This statutory right is not of constitutional dimension, since [t]he rereading of testimony is not a critical stage of the proceedings. ( Ayala, supra, 23 Cal.4th at p. 288, 96 Cal.Rptr.2d 682, 1 P.3d 3.) Because the jury here never made a request to have the testimony reread, there was no statutory violation. Instead, the jury requested a report that was not in evidence; the jury never thereafter responded to the court's suggestion that the entire testimony be read back. The suggestion by defendant that the trial court's decision not to permit the reading of portions of the testimony of a witness amounted to jury coercion is without merit. The trial court made it clear, prior to trial, that rereading a portion of a witness's testimony was not permitted because testimony could then be taken out of context. This decision was well within the sound discretion of the court. We recently rejected this very argument in People v. Hillhouse (2002) 27 Cal.4th 469, 506-507, 117 Cal.Rptr.2d 45, 40 P.3d 754: [Defendant argues the court erred in advising the jury it would hear the entire testimony of any given witness. This portion of the instruction did not violate section 1138 [of the Penal Code]. That statute mandates the readback of testimony at jury request, but it does not forbid giving the jury more than it requests so it also receives the context. Defendant speculates the jury may have wanted a rereading of some part of [the witness's] testimony but chose not to request it because the entire testimony was lengthy.... But in any event, the court made clear it would provide any requested rereading of material testimony. Merely informing the jury of the time it may take for rehearing testimony is not impermissible jury coercion. [Citation.] Moreover, in the present case, the jury had had the entirety of Joanna's and Darlene's testimony reread, which entailed over two days of rereading. This jury, therefore, was quite capable of requesting extensive readback. It did not. People v. Warren (1900) 130 Cal. 678, 681-682, 63 P. 87, and People v. Slaughter (1917) 33 Cal. App. 365, 378-379, 165 P. 44, are on point. In each case, the trial court informed the jury that the requested readback would take hours; thereafter each jury reached a verdict without hearing the requested readback. Our court and the Court of Appeal found no violation of Penal Code section 1138. Based on the foregoing authority, we similarly find no error here.