Opinion ID: 1119473
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: The Specific Issue of Objective Reasonableness

Text: The foregoing substantive and evidentiary principles direct the present inquiry: we must identify those aspects of BWS not only sufficiently beyond the ken of the average juror to warrant expert testimony but also specifically relevant to the jury's determination whether the defendant had a reasonable belief that [she would] lose [her] life or suffer serious bodily injury unless [she] immediately defend[ed] [herself] against the attack of the adversary. ( People v. Scoggins, supra, 37 Cal. at p. 683.) Despite the extensive and vivid, even lurid, details of battering relationships, the literature and published opinions contain relatively limited discussion, even on an anecdotal basis, of BWS directly relating to objective reasonableness. The single most pertinent aspect, which defendant here invokes, is the hypervigilance generated by the cycles of abuse that mark these relationships. As the commentators explain: [T]he battered woman's familiarity with her husband's violence may enable her to recognize the subtle signs that usually precede a severe beating.... Moreover, even if the woman kills her husband when he is only threatening her, rather than actually beating her, she knows from past experience that he is not merely making idle comments but is fully capable of carrying out his threats. Thus, the battered woman may reasonably fear imminent danger from her husband when others unfamiliar with the history of abuse would not. (Kinports, Defending Battered Women's Self-Defense Claims (1988) 67 Or. L.Rev. 393, 423-424, fns. omitted; Crocker, The Meaning of Equality for Battered Women Who Kill Men in Self-Defense (1985) 8 Harv. Women's L.J. 121, 141, 143; Walker, Battered Women Syndrome and Self-Defense (1992) 6 Notre Dame J.L. Ethics & Pub. Pol'y 321, 324, 328.) [E]xperts testify that, because a battered woman is attuned to her abuser's pattern of attacks, she learns to recognize subtle gestures or threats that distinguish the severity of attacks and that lead her to believe a particular attack will seriously threaten her survival. ( Developments in the Law  Legal Responses to Domestic Violence (1993) 106 Harv. L.Rev. 1498, 1582, fn. omitted.) In a related vein, researchers also note that [w]hen a woman kills her batterer, the abuse almost always will have escalated both in frequency and intensity in the period immediately preceding the killing. (Rosen, On Self-Defense, Imminence, and Women Who Kill Their Batterers (1993) 71 N.C.L.Rev. 371, 401, fn. omitted; see Walker et al., Beyond the Juror's Ken: Battered Women (1982) 7 Vt. L.Rev. 1, 3; Browne, When Battered Women Kill (1987) pp. 68-69, 105-107.) Expert testimony [shows] that among battered women who kill, the final incident that precipitates the killing is viewed by the battered woman as `more severe and more life-threatening than prior incidents.' [Citation.] ( Commonwealth v. Stonehouse (1989) 521 Pa. 41, 63 [555 A.2d 772, 784], fn. omitted.) On the basis of her experience, a battered woman may thus be better able to predict the likely degree of violence in any particular battering incident (Ewing, Battered Women Who Kill (1987) p. 55) and in turn may more precisely assess the measure and speed of force necessary to resist. ( People v. Aris, supra, 215 Cal. App.3d at p. 1194.) Judicial analysis reflects the relevance of BWS to the objective component of self-defense. In State v. Kelly (1984) 97 N.J. 178, 193 [478 A.2d 364, 371], the trial court had excluded expert evidence on BWS. The New Jersey Supreme Court reversed and observed, Depending on its content, the expert's testimony might also enable the jury to find that the battered wife, because of the prior beatings, numerous beatings, as often as once a week, for seven years, from the day they were married to the day he died, is particularly able to predict accurately the likely extent of violence in any attack on her. That conclusion could significantly affect the jury's evaluation of the reasonableness of defendant's fear for her life. (478 A.2d at p. 378, fn. omitted; Robinson v. State (1992) 308 S.C. 74 [417 S.E.2d 88, 91] [battered women can experience a heightened sense of imminent danger arising from the perpetual terror of physical and mental abuse].) In People v. Torres (1985) 128 Misc.2d 129 [488 N.Y.S.2d 358], the trial court also rejected proffered expert testimony. The reviewing court found error; the evidence was relevant in part because the expert would testify that a battered woman, through her extensive experience with prolonged physical abuse, learns to distinguish between varying degrees of danger and violence. This expert explanation concerning acute discriminatory powers would provide a basis for the jury to understand how at the time of the shooting [the batterer's] violence had, in the defendant's mind, passed from the `normal' and tolerable into the `abnormal' and life-threatening. (488 N.Y.S.2d at p. 362.) By placing the final incidence of abuse in context, the testimony might enlighten the jury's assessment of a reasonable person's perceptions as well. (See also State v. Gallegos (1986) 104 N.M. 247 [719 P.2d 1268, 1271] [Incidents of domestic violence tend to follow predictable patterns. Recurring stimuli, such as drunkenness or jealousy, reliably incite brutal rages. Remarks or gestures which are merely offensive or perhaps even meaningless to the general public may be understood by the abused individual as an affirmation of impending physical abuse.]; State v. Allery (1984) 101 Wn.2d 591, 597 [682 P.2d 312, 316] [[E]xpert testimony explaining why a person suffering from [BWS] would ... fear increased aggression against herself would be helpful to a jury in understanding a phenomenon not within the competence of an ordinary lay person and also is central to her claim of self-defense. [Citation.]].) There is a clear nexus between the phenomenon of hypervigilance and the objective component of self-defense, i.e., the reasonable fear of imminent injury or death and the perceived need to react with the speed and force used. Under settled principles, if the victim's threats caused the defendant `to fear greater peril than she would have had otherwise, [the jury may] take such facts into consideration in determining whether defendant acted in a manner which a reasonable person would act in protecting his or her own life or bodily safety.' ( People v. Moore, supra, 43 Cal.2d at p. 528.) For the same reasons, the defendant may also be `justified in acting more quickly and taking harsher measures for her own protection in event of assault, than would a person who had not received such threats....' ( Ibid. ; People v. Bush, supra, 84 Cal. App.3d at p. 304; People v. Torres (1949) 94 Cal. App.2d 146, 152-153 [210 P.2d 324].) When antecedent threats have accompanied a recurring cycle of escalating abuse, their relevance to the reasonableness of the defendant's fear of imminent and more serious violence is manifest. Although relevant to the objective component of self-defense, BWS evidence is necessarily subject to qualifications and limitations when proffered on that issue. Evidence Code section 1107 is a rule of evidence only; no substantive change affecting the Penal Code is intended. (Evid. Code, § 1107, subd. (d).) Expert testimony is therefore not relevant until the defendant puts at issue conduct or circumstances the jury might not otherwise understand as the basis for self-defense, i.e., that absent BWS evidence would not be considered reasonable. (See Behr v. County of Santa Cruz (1959) 172 Cal. App.2d 697, 709-710 [342 P.2d 987], and cases cited; see also State v. Gallegos, supra, 719 P.2d at p. 1271; cf. People v. Bothuel, supra, 205 Cal. App.3d at p. 587.) In many circumstances, BWS will be irrelevant to the question of objective reasonableness because the facts raise a traditional and therefore readily assessable self-defense claim, for example, when the victim threatens or approaches the defendant with a gun or knife or when the two struggle over a weapon following a threat or other hostile act by the victim. In such classic confrontations, [f]ear is a common human emotion within the understanding of a jury and hence expert psychiatric explanation is not necessary. A jury is as capable as [the expert] in determining the ultimate fact in this case whether [the defendant] acted under fear when she shot her husband. ( State v. Griffiths (1980) 101 Idaho 163, 165 [610 P.2d 522, 524], overruled on other grounds in State v. LePage (1981) 102 Idaho 387 [630 P.2d 674, 683]; cf. People v. Czahara (1988) 203 Cal. App.3d 1468, 1478 [250 Cal. Rptr. 836] [whether events would have provoked the ordinary reasonable person to an unreasoning passion not a subject sufficiently beyond common experience to warrant expert opinion].) In other circumstances, however, the situation may be confrontational but lack such overt or obvious potential for serious harm. Nevertheless, in light of her history of battering by the victim, the defendant may anticipate imminent bodily injury or death. Or, following an initial struggle in which she gained a temporary advantage, she may continue to fear the victim because she knows he reacts violently to loss of control or she senses an escalating severity to his violence. [Where] there has been physical abuse over a long period of time, the circumstances which assist the court in determining the reasonableness of a defendant's fear of death or serious injury at the time of a killing include the defendant's familiarity with the victim's behavior in the past. ( Commonwealth v. Stonehouse, supra, 555 A.2d at p. 781.) The cyclical nature of an intimate battering relationship enables a battered spouse to become expert at recognizing the warning signs of an impending assault from her partner  signs frequently imperceptible to outsiders. For some victims, the sign may be `that look in his eye'; for others, it is the advent of heavy drinking, or heightened irrational jealousy. ( Banks v. State (1992) 92 Md. App. 422, 429 [608 A.2d 1249, 1252].) Although a jury might not find the appearances sufficient to provoke a reasonable person's fear, they might conclude otherwise as to a reasonable person's perception of the reality when enlightened by expert testimony on the concept of hypervigilance. The expert evidence thus is aimed at an area where the purported common knowledge of the jury may be very much mistaken, an area where jurors' logic, drawn from their own experience, may lead to a wholly incorrect conclusion, an area where expert knowledge would enable the jurors to disregard their prior conclusions as being common myths rather than common knowledge. ( State v. Kelly, supra, 478 A.2d at p. 378; Ibn-Tamas v. United States, supra, 407 A.2d at p. 634; Hawthorne v. State (Fla. Dist. Ct. App. 1982) 408 So.2d 801, 806-807.) Nevertheless, the expert must not usurp the function of the jury and reach the ultimate question of reasonableness. (See People v. Aris, supra, 215 Cal. App.3d at pp. 1197-1198.) The concept of hypervigilance is not the evidentiary equivalent of, or substitute for, an actual perception of impending danger, only a possible explanation for the defendant's reaction to a perceived threat. (Cf. People v. Bledsoe, supra, 36 Cal.3d at pp. 249-251 [rape trauma syndrome evidence admissible to rebut misconceptions about rape victims but not to establish crime occurred].) Either the jury accepts or rejects that explanation.... No expert is needed, ... once the jury has made up its mind on those issues, to tell the jury the logical conclusion, namely, that a person who has in fact been severely and continuously beaten might very well reasonably fear that the imminent beating she was about to suffer could be either life-threatening or pose a risk of serious injury. ( State v. Kelly, supra, 478 A.2d at p. 378, fn. omitted.) The determination must remain objective even though the inquiry may be individualized by consideration of BWS. Finally, since BWS is admissible only narrowly on the issue of objective reasonableness, a limiting instruction is appropriate upon request to restrict the evidence to its proper scope.... (Evid. Code, § 355; see Daggett v. Atchison, T. & S.F. Ry. Co. (1957) 48 Cal.2d 655, 665-666 [313 P.2d 557, 64 A.L.R.2d 1283]; cf. People v. Bothuel, supra, 205 Cal. App.3d at p. 589.) In assessing a claim of self-defense the jury must not confuse the question whether a reasonable person in the defendant's circumstances would have perceived a threat of imminent injury or death with the notion that killing the abuser would be a reasonable, i.e., understandable, response to ongoing physical and psychological abuse. Absent a limitation, the jury may read the instructions to imply a separate standard in BWS cases. While courts in some jurisdictions refer to the reasonably prudent battered woman, ( Commonwealth v. Stonehouse, supra, 555 A.2d at p. 784; see also State v. Kelly, supra, 478 A.2d at p. 385, fn. 23), California maintains a single standard for all defendants who claim they acted in self-defense. Moreover, the jury must appreciate that opinion testimony is not dispositive but only to aid in coming to a conclusion, and it does not exclude consideration of other evidence which is pertinent to the issue involved. [Citations.] ( Neel v. Mannings, Inc. (1942) 19 Cal.2d 647, 654 [122 P.2d 576].)