Opinion ID: 2584774
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Trial Court's Comments on Voir Dire, and Jury Instructions

Text: Defendant contends the trial court violated his state and federal constitutional rights to due process, to a jury trial, to present a defense, to a penalty determination based on all available mitigating evidence, and to a reliable penalty determination by giving biased explanations to prospective jurors during voir dire, and by improperly placing on the jury the burden of determining which guilt phase instructions applied to the penalty phase. He also complains that the court gave the jury an incorrect supplemental instruction during defense counsel's closing argument. We reject these contentions.
During voir dire of the first and second panels of prospective jurors, the trial court made general comments about capital cases. The court explained that aggravating factors make the crime worse than it normally would be and that mitigating factors are the opposite, as they tend to ameliorate the punishment. The court gave brief examples of aggravating and mitigating factors. In its comments to the first panel, the court cautioned that [t]hese are just examples; not at all an exhaustive list. In its comments to the second panel, the court stated, And the court will give you a rather exhaustive list, if we ever get to that point. In addition, during the voir dire of a prospective juror on the second panel, the trial court commented: You have to weigh the bad things, serious things about the case, versus the mitigating factors, the things that make the crime perhaps less blameworthy or good things about the defendant's background. Defendant argues that the trial court's comments, which he mischaracterizes as jury instructions, were biased and misled the jury because they did not include a statement that mitigation includes any other circumstance that extenuates the gravity of the crime. (§ 190.3, factor (k).) The trial court, however, was not instructing the jury at the time it made the comments in question. Indeed it was conducting voir dire of prospective jurors. Its comments `were not intended to be, and were not, a substitute for full instructions at the end of trial.' ( People v. Seaton (2001) 26 Cal.4th 598, 636 [110 Cal.Rptr.2d 441, 28 P.3d 175].) `The purpose of these comments was to give prospective jurors, most of whom had little or no familiarity with courts in general and penalty phase death penalty trials in particular, a general idea of the nature of the proceeding.' ( People v. Livaditis (1992) 2 Cal.4th 759, 781 [9 Cal.Rptr.2d 72, 831 P.2d 297].) In the context of voir dire, the trial court's comments in this case were proper.
Just before the trial court read to the jury the penalty phase instructions, it commented: I am not going to reread to you the guilt phase instruction packet. There is no need to do so. And a great many of those instructions simply no longer apply, you don't need to concern yourself with them. However, you may refer to the guilt phase instructions for definitions [of] such things as attempted robbery for example will be mentioned in these instructions, it was also mentioned in the guilt phase so you may if you need to refresh your recollection as to what that charge entails, for example you should take a look at the guilt phase instructions. Likewise, the term reasonable doubt is used in a portion I will read you now, reasonable doubt is defined in the guilt phase instruction so if you need to refer back to that you may. [¶] Likewise, credibility of witnesses so forth, we had witnesses testify, both phases so when you get to judging credibility again guilt phase instruction 2.20 touched on that. Many of them will apply. If you need further clarification whether one does or does not apply, let us know, send a note out and we will certainly deal with it. Primary difference was at the guilt stage I told you all not to consider penalty or punishment and I've told you not to consider sympathy and things of that nature. And now those instructions no longer apply because of [ sic ] the penalty phase you are obviously to consider penalty and punishment and the sympathetic factors set forth and shown by the evidence are not to be ignored by the jury in th[is] phase. That will be the primary difference. The trial court also instructed the jury to [d]isregard all instructions given to you in other phases of this trial if they conflict with anything stated in these instructions. Defendant contends the trial court's failure to specify for the jury which of the guilt phase instructions were to apply at the penalty phase must have misled the jury. Of particular significance, defendant argues, was the guilt phase instruction that the jury was not to be influenced by, among other things, sympathy. There was no error. (16) Defendant correctly observes that a trial court's failure to specify which previously given guilt phase instructions apply at the penalty phase may mislead the jury ( People v. Weaver (2001) 26 Cal.4th 876, 982 [111 Cal.Rptr.2d 2, 29 P.3d 103]), and that we have admonished trial courts that they should expressly inform the jury at the penalty phase which of the instructions previously given continue to apply ( People v. Babbitt (1988) 45 Cal.3d 660, 718, fn. 26 [248 Cal.Rptr. 69, 755 P.2d 253]). But a trial court's failure to do so is error only if there is a reasonable likelihood that the jury was misled. ( People v. Weaver, supra, 26 Cal.4th at p. 984.) No such reasonable likelihood is present here. The trial court told the jury that many of the guilt phase instructions would not apply at the penalty phase, and to disregard any guilt phase instructions that conflicted with the penalty phase instructions. And it specifically singled out punishment and sympathy as matters obviously to be considered by the jury at the penalty phase. Accordingly, no error occurred.
The trial court interrupted defense counsel's penalty phase argument to give the jury a supplemental instruction. Defendant contends the supplemental instruction improperly limited the jury's consideration of defendant's good character evidence. We disagree. During his penalty phase argument to the jury, defense counsel said: I also believe that both that the families involved here and there are three, there's the Hau family, there's the Afable family, and there's the Ramirez [Romero] family. If you think the Ramirez [Romero] family isn't hurt, you haven't been thinking. I see in your sympathetic consideration no reason why after putting two families through this I know of no mother, as a matter of fact you heard it yesterday, when Mrs. Romero is still in denial. She's not unusual in that fashion. Even though I am a member of a mother/son relationship, they are estranged. And I can understand how they are. [¶] So it's not that Gerardo hurt other people, he hurt his family, too. I see no reason to increase that, particularly when you can't bring Reynaldo back, or you can't bring Eugene back. There is no way. [¶] The way the sheriff handles things hopefully it will get better. I'm not here to dump on the sheriff, there is enough people dumping on him already with respect to getting health care for the inmates, or I don't know but the way that you solve how the sheriff behaves, how these incidents. The trial court then interrupted defense counsel and told the jury: Your job is to weigh the aggravation, weigh the mitigation, arrive at a penalty in that fashion. That is without regard to the effect that that decision will have on anyone other than this defendant. So you can't vote for death to make the victim's family better. You can't hold for life to make the defendant's mother feel better. That is not what this is about. This is not about the sheriff's department or sending a message if we will hear that. (17) Defendant faults that supplemental instruction for not telling the jury his family's feelings for him were relevant as evidence of his character. We perceive no error. The trial court's comments were prompted by defense counsel's argument to the jury that the defendant's punishment should not be death because that would worsen the anguish of defendant's family. As this court held in People v. Ochoa (1998) 19 Cal.4th 353, 456 [79 Cal.Rptr.2d 408, 966 P.2d 442], sympathy for a defendant's family is not a matter that a capital jury can consider in mitigation, but ... family members may offer testimony of the impact of an execution on them if by so doing they illuminate some positive quality of the defendant's background or character. Fairly read, here defense counsel's argument was designed to invoke sympathy for defendant's family, not to highlight a positive attribute of defendant's background or character. Consequently, there was no error in the challenged instruction.