Opinion ID: 1127477
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 6

Heading: Sexual Victimization

Text: Defendant first contends the trial court improperly denied his motion to conduct voir dire of the prospective jurors as to any sexual victimization they may have experienced. In fact, defendant's motion below was limited to childhood experiences of the prospective jurors, or those close to the jurors. The trial court denied the motion based on the weakness of the showing of the relevance of childhood sexual victimization to the death-qualifying process in this case. There was no error. (8) The purpose of Hovey voir dire is to ascertain whether any prospective juror has such conscientious or religious scruples about capital punishment that his or her views would prevent or substantially impair adherence to the instructions and the juror's oath. ( People v. Clark (1990) 50 Cal.3d 583, 596 [268 Cal. Rptr. 399, 789 P.2d 127].) The inquiry seeks to determine only the views of the prospective jurors about capital punishment in the abstract, to determine if any, because of opposition to the death penalty, would `vote against the death penalty without regard to the evidence produced at trial.' ( Id. at p. 597, italics in original.) However, [a] prospective juror who would invariably vote either for or against the death penalty because of one or more circumstances likely to be present in the case being tried, without regard to the strength of aggravating and mitigating circumstances, is therefore subject to challenge for cause. ( People v. Kirkpatrick (1994) 7 Cal.4th 988, 1005 [30 Cal. Rptr.2d 818, 874 P.2d 248].) (7b) In this case, no evidence regarding defendant's sexual victimization of children was anticipated. Rather, both the sodomy of James B., and any inference of sexual violence arising from Lingle's impalement by the stake, were committed against adults. The trial court acted within its discretion in concluding that inquiry regarding the prospective jurors' childhood sexual victimization experiences was too remote from the issues at hand. (See People v. DeSantis, supra, 2 Cal.4th at pp. 1217-1218 [refusal to allow voir dire questioning about specific crimes that would cause prospective juror to vote automatically for death]; People v. Hovey, supra, 28 Cal.3d at p. 81, fn. 137.) Moreover, contrary to defendant's assertion, the trial court expressly stated that it was not deciding what questions could be asked during general voir dire. Thus, defendant was not precluded from attempting to show during general voir dire that a prospective juror harbored any specific bias that would cause him or her to vote for the death penalty without regard to the evidence presented, and thus should be excused for cause. [5] ( People v. Clark, supra, 50 Cal.3d at p. 597.)