Opinion ID: 1190445
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Prosecutor's references to religion

Text: (27) Defendant contends at some length that the prosecutor improperly relied on biblical references in urging the jury to impose the death penalty. Defendant concedes his trial counsel failed to object to these references, which precludes review of this issue on direct appeal. He is correct. His objection is waived. ( People v. Poggi (1988) 45 Cal.3d 306, 335 [246 Cal. Rptr. 886, 753 P.2d 1082].) To preserve a claim of prosecutorial misconduct during the penalty phase, the defense must both object and request a curative jury admonition. ( Ibid. ) Defendant did neither. Moreover, defendant's concession of waiver is an understatement. Trial counsel not only failed to object, but he relied at length on the Bible as support for not imposing the death penalty. Perhaps to avoid his waiver, defendant argues that the prosecutor's allegedly improper references ... illustrate the severity of the improper, irrelevant and unconstitutional arguments to which appellant's jury was subjected. (See People v. Poggi, supra, 45 Cal.3d 335.) Defendant fails to explain how the biblical references had any connection with the unidentified unconstitutional arguments he asserts, but his challenge to those references is set forth in the portion of his brief dealing with error under Ramos, supra, 37 Cal.3d 136. Perhaps the suggestion is that the biblical argument somehow exacerbated the prejudice under Ramos. If so, the argument fails for three reasons: (1) There is no logical nexus between the Ramos error and the prosecutor's biblical references. The two matters are entirely unrelated. For example, we do not see, and the jury could not have seen, any connection between the Bible and The Dirty Dozen. (2) We have found no prejudice under Ramos. The biblical argument could not have exacerbated a prejudice that did not exist. (3) As defendant concedes, the challenge to the biblical argument was waived. Defendant appears to be attempting to evade the effect of his failure to object by merely casting the argument in a different light. This is not permissible. (Similarly, if defendant means to argue that the biblical references were themselves improper under Ramos, we reject that argument because, as he concedes, that objection is waived.) For all these reasons, we reject the contention that the allegedly improper biblical argument somehow created or increased prejudice under Ramos.