Opinion ID: 1152592
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 6

Heading: Assertion of marital privilege.

Text: (37) Defendant's wife, Darlene Lucas, invoked the marital privilege and refused to testify at the penalty trial. Defendant argues (1) the court erred in permitting her to invoke the privilege, and (2) defense counsel provided ineffective assistance of counsel in failing to point out that the marital privilege only permits the spouse to refuse to give testimony against his or her spouse. His wife's testimony, defendant claimed, would have supported his defense. Although a person generally has no privilege to refuse to testify in favor of his or her spouse in a criminal proceeding, Evidence Code section 970 provides that a married person has a privilege not to testify against his or her spouse who is a party in any proceeding. The privilege belongs to the married person, not the spouse who is the party. (Cal. Law Revision Com. com., Deering's Ann. Evid. Code (1986 ed.) foll. § 970, p. 139; see also People v. Chavez (1968) 262 Cal. App.2d 422, 429 [68 Cal. Rptr. 759].) Accordingly, defendant's claim that defense counsel mistakenly permitted defendant's wife to invoke the privilege not to testify against her husband is misplaced. Under Evidence Code section 973, subdivision (a), if a married person chooses to testify in a proceeding in which his or her spouse is a party, the person waives the privilege and must answer potentially damaging questions on cross-examination. [A] married person cannot call his spouse as a witness to give favorable testimony and have that spouse invoke the privilege provided in Section 970 to keep from testifying on cross-examination to unfavorable matters.... (Cal. Law Revision Com. com., Deering's Ann. Evid. Code, supra, foll. § 973, p. 146; see also People v. Resendez (1993) 12 Cal. App.4th 98, 107-109 [15 Cal. Rptr.2d 575]; 2 Witkin, Cal. Evidence, supra, § 1177, pp. 1122-1123.) The trial court may have concluded defendant's wife was invoking the privilege to avoid such an eventuality, even if her testimony on direct examination would have been favorable to defendant, for the record indicates she may have been a percipient witness on the night of the crime. In fact, she invoked the marital privilege when called by the prosecution at the preliminary hearing, and defendant does not contend this was error. But even assuming judicial error, defendant is unable to demonstrate prejudice, because the record contains no offer of proof regarding the content of Darlene Lucas's proposed testimony. As for the claim counsel were incompetent for conceding Mrs. Lucas had the right to invoke the privilege, the claim is based on the unsupported assumption that counsel must have made the concession under a mistake of law regarding the scope of the privilege. Further, as noted above, prejudice cannot be demonstrated on this silent record. It should be recalled that, depending on the nature of the proposed testimony, the witness's favorable testimony might have opened her to damaging cross-examination which could not be fended off under a claim of marital privilege.