Opinion ID: 1309317
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Admission of Photo of Victims While Alive

Text: (7) Defendant contends the court erred in admitting a photograph of the victims that was taken when they were alive. At trial, defendant offered to stipulate (1) that the bodies found at the scene of the killings were the Margulies and (2) that they had been alive prior to the incident. He objected to the admission of the photo as irrelevant and unduly prejudicial. As defendant asserts, People v. Ramos (1982) 30 Cal.3d 553, 577-578 [180 Cal. Rptr. 266, 639 P.2d 908], indicates that such photographs probably should be excluded. Nonetheless, as in Ramos, we find the error was not prejudicial. The case against defendant was quite strong: he was identified as the person hiding in the bushes at the victims' house on the day of the murders, his fingerprints were found at the scene of the crime, he participated in a burglary of the victims' store just a few hours after the murder occurred, and the keys to the store that had been taken from the victims' house at the time of the murders were found in his home. The introduction of the photograph of the victims could not have affected the verdict. ( People v. Watson (1956) 46 Cal.2d 818, 836 [299 P.2d 243].)