Opinion ID: 2590272
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Instruction on felony murder based upon aiding and abetting

Text: The jury was instructed pursuant to CALJIC No. 8.27: If a human being is killed by any one of several persons engaged in the commission or attempted commission of the crime of robbery or kidnapping, all persons, who either directly and actively commit the act constituting such crime, or who with knowledge of the unlawful purpose of the perpetrator of the crime and with the intent or purpose of committing, encouraging, or facilitating the commission of the offense, aid, promote, encourage, or instigate by act or advice its commission, are guilty of murder of the first degree, whether the killing is intentional, unintentional or accidental. Seeking to modify the instruction by pinpointing the ensuing consequences in the event the jury believed the robbery or kidnapping was completed prior to the shooting of the victim, defendant requested language adding: If a human being is killed by one of several persons after the commission or attempted commission of the crime of robbery or kidnapping was completed, who either directly and actively commit the act constituting such crime, or who with knowledge of the unlawful purpose of the perpetrator of the crime and with the intent or purpose of committing, encouraging, or facilitating the commission of the offense, aid, promote, encourage, or instigate by act or advice its commission, [the defendants] are not guilty of the murder of the first degree by that reason alone, whether the killing is intentional, unintentional, or accidental. The jury properly was instructed concerning the consequences of a determination that the underlying felonies had been completed prior to the shooting. (CALJIC No. 8.27.) As with the instructions discussed above, defendant's modification merely restated the existing instruction by presenting the converse of the instructional command, and by stating a circumstance that flowed logically from the existing language. The trial court's refusal to add duplicative language to the existing instruction was not error. ( People v. Moon, supra, 37 Cal.4th at p. 32; People v. Ochoa, supra, 26 Cal.4th at p. 455.)