Opinion ID: 1152592
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Capital charging decision.

Text: At trial, defendant sought discovery pursuant to Murgia v. Municipal Court (1975) 15 Cal.3d 286 [124 Cal. Rptr. 204, 540 P.2d 44] in an effort to show the prosecutor charged special circumstances and was seeking the death penalty due to purposeful, invidious discrimination. The trial court directed the district attorney's office to provide discovery regarding its capital charging policies, and there was a hearing on the matter. The prosecutor's supervisor in the district attorney's office also testified regarding the office's charging practices and his reasons for deciding whether to seek the death penalty in this and a number of other recent cases. Much of this testimony occurred at a hearing held after the guilt verdicts were rendered, but before the penalty trial. The court concluded the district attorney's office had specific guidelines for making a capital charging decision which it had followed without caprice in this case. The court declared the capital charging decision to have been fair and equitable. (26) On appeal, defendant does not claim invidious discrimination or vindictive prosecution. Rather, relying on the state and federal Constitutions, he now claims he was deprived of procedural due process in the charging decision because the factors deemed by the [district attorney] to be essential in determining [whether to charge special circumstances and seek the death penalty] were not properly applied in his case. Specifically, he claims the trial prosecutor committed misconduct in providing his supervisors in the district attorney's office with misleading or erroneous information that may have influenced the charging decision under the office's internal charging standards. For example, defendant claims the prosecutor told his supervisor one of the victims was killed with her sleeping mask on, although neither the crime reports nor the trial evidence contained any evidence she was wearing a sleeping mask. Without such misleading or false information, defendant claims, the district attorney's office might not have elected to charge special circumstances and seek the death penalty in this case. He relies on Hicks v. Oklahoma (1980) 447 U.S. 343 [65 L.Ed.2d 175, 100 S.Ct. 2227] for the proposition that he had a due process right to have the prosecutor's charging decision made on the basis of all available evidence and upon accurate evidence. Defendant did not allege prosecutorial misconduct in this connection at the trial court. Accordingly, the claim of misconduct was waived. (See People v. Hardy, supra, 2 Cal.4th at p. 171.) Further, to the extent defendant is claiming a violation of due process in the charging decision, defendant did not make a motion to dismiss or to strike the special circumstances on this basis, and should not be permitted to raise the matter for the first time here. ( People v. Edwards, supra, 54 Cal.3d at p. 827 [claim of vindictive prosecution not preserved for appeal unless it was a basis for motion to dismiss in trial court].) In any event, even if we were to reach the merits, we find no legal support for defendant's claim that he had a right to have the charging decision based upon all the evidence reasonably available to the district attorney's office and upon an accurate presentation of the evidence. Prosecutors have broad discretion to decide whom to charge, and for what crime. As we have observed, [i]t is well established, of course, that a district attorney's enforcement authority includes the discretion either to prosecute or to decline to prosecute an individual when there is probable cause to believe he has committed a crime. ( Davis v. Municipal Court (1988) 46 Cal.3d 64, 77 [249 Cal. Rptr. 300, 757 P.2d 11]; see also Bordenkircher v. Hayes (1978) 434 U.S. 357, 364 [54 L.Ed.2d 604, 611-612, 98 S.Ct. 663].) Absent proof of invidious or vindictive prosecution, as a general matter a defendant who has been duly convicted of a capital crime under a constitutional death penalty statute may not be heard to complain on appeal of the prosecutor's exercise of discretion in charging him with special circumstances and seeking the death penalty. (See Gov. Code, § 26501; People v. Pinholster (1992) 1 Cal.4th 865, 971 [4 Cal. Rptr.2d 765, 824 P.2d 571] [courts generally do not review capital charging decision unless there is invidious discrimination in prosecution]; People v. Morris (1991) 53 Cal.3d 152, 235, fn. 25 [279 Cal. Rptr. 720, 807 P.2d 949] [prosecutor's exercise of charging discretion generally not pertinent to a review of a capital sentence]; People v. Keenan (1988) 46 Cal.3d 478, 506 [250 Cal. Rptr. 550, 758 P.2d 1081] [prosecutor's exercise of discretion in capital charging not unconstitutional]; Murgia v. Municipal Court, supra, 15 Cal.3d at pp. 297, 300 [defendant may seek relief from invidious discrimination in prosecution]; see also In re Bower (1985) 38 Cal.3d 865, 874-877 [215 Cal. Rptr. 267, 700 P.2d 1269] [vindictive prosecution barred]; Twiggs v. Superior Court (1983) 34 Cal.3d 360, 369-374 [194 Cal. Rptr. 152, 667 P.2d 1165] [same].) Accordingly, the factual predicates for the prosecutor's charging decision should not be subject to scrutiny unless there is a claim of invidious discrimination or vindictive prosecution. Defendant seems to argue that the guaranty of due process assures his right to have the prosecutor make the initial capital charging decision according to certain standards, and that the alleged misconduct of the trial deputy undermined the ability of the district attorney's office to apply such standards. He cites Hicks v. Oklahoma, supra, 447 U.S. 343, in support. In that case, the high court decided that when a state vests the jury with sentencing discretion, and the jury imposes sentence under an unconstitutional statute, the defendant has a due process right to resentencing, though the second jury might impose as harsh a sentence as that mandated by the invalidated statute. The defendant has a substantial and legitimate expectation that he will be deprived of his liberty only to the extent determined by the jury in the exercise of its statutory discretion, [citation], and that liberty interest is one that the Fourteenth Amendment preserves against arbitrary deprivation by the state. ( Id. at p. 346 [65 L.Ed.2d at p. 180].) Although defendant does not explain his citation to Hicks, we surmise that he wishes to draw a parallel between the function of the jury in that case and that of the prosecutor vested with the charging decision in his case. In Hicks, the defendant had a right to a jury that properly exercised its sentencing discretion, and presumably defendant is claiming he has a due process right to have the prosecutor properly exercise his charging discretion in this case. Defendant's claim that he has a right to have the prosecutor make the initial charging decision according to certain nonarbitrary standards has been rejected. ( People v. Keenan, supra, 46 Cal.3d at p. 505.) Putting aside claims of invidious discrimination in prosecution or vindictive prosecution, which are not at stake here, we do not review the prosecutor's standards for seeking the death penalty to assure that they are fair and nonarbitrary. ( Ibid. ) Rather, we have determined that the requisite `standards' are those minimum standards set forth in a constitutional death penalty statute. By acceptably narrowing the circumstances under which capital punishment may be sought and imposed, such a law satisfies the constitutional prohibition against arbitrary and capricious exaction of the death penalty. ( Id. at p. 506.) We have similarly concluded that prosecutorial discretion in selecting the cases to be subject to a capital charge does not amount to a due process violation. ( Id. at p. 505.) If we do not review the prosecutor's standards for making the capital charging decision, we certainly do not attempt to determine whether there was an accurate factual basis for the charging decision pursuant to the prosecutor's own internal charging standards. Defendant's claim that the prosecutor's alleged misstatements of the evidence caused the supervising deputy vested with ultimate charging discretion to fail to follow internal office charging policies is simply not subject to review in the absence of a claim of invidious discrimination or vindictive prosecution.