Opinion ID: 2545831
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 9

Heading: Consideration of unadjudicated crimes

Text: In People v. Johnson (1993) 6 Cal.4th 1, 23 Cal.Rptr.2d 593, 859 P.2d 673, we held that the trial court at the penalty phase had no obligation to instruct the jury, without request, that it should not use the `inference of criminal propensity drawn from proof of one incident of unadjudicated conduct as proof of the truth of the allegations of another such incident.' ( Id. at p. 49, 23 Cal.Rptr.2d 593, 859 P.2d 673.) We explained that a trial court, as a general rule, owes no obligation to instruct on the limited purposes for which evidence of prior crimes is admissible. ( Ibid. ) We rejected the defendant's contention that this general rule should not apply to the penalty phase of a capital trial in light of the trial court's instruction that (1) evidence of various specified criminal acts had been presented, (2) before the jury could use evidence of any such offense as an aggravating circumstance, it must find beyond a reasonable doubt that such offense occurred, and (3) except for such offenses, the jury `may not consider any evidence of any other criminal acts as an aggravating circumstance.' ( Id. at pp. 49-50, 23 Cal. Rptr.2d 593, 859 P.2d 673.) Here, the trial court's instruction to the jury was substantially similar to the one at issue in People v. Johnson, supra, 6 Cal.4th 1, 23 Cal.Rptr.2d 593, 859 P.2d 673. [4] Defendant seeks to distinguish Johnson on the ground that it addressed only the use of unadjudicated criminal offenses to show criminal propensity but not the use of adjudicated criminal offenses for that purpose. Defendant observes that the jury had already convicted him of the first degree murders of Weber, Duarte, and Abono. He suggests that without a limiting instruction, the jury may well have considered evidence of his commission of those murders as showing his propensity to commit murders, in determining whether he had committed the unadjudicated murder of his mother and attempted murders of Al Redenius and Donna Smith. He points to the prosecutor's argument to the jury comparing defendant's behavior in the adjudicated murders with his behavior in the unadjudicated murder of his mother. For instance, the prosecutor argued that lying about the death was typical of defendant. [A]s he has done with Liz Duarte and others, [defendant] started fabricating his defense, creating something out of nothing. And the prosecutor pointed out that like other murders committed by defendant, the murder of his mother had a financial motive because he owed his mother over $60,000. In addition, defendant faults trial counsel for not seeking a limiting instruction and for not objecting to the prosecutor's comparison of the adjudicated offenses to the unadjudicated offenses. According to defendant, when considered together, the absence of a limiting instruction, the prosecutor's arguments, and defense counsel's failings violated the federal Constitution's Fifth, Sixth, Eighth, and Fourteenth Amendments. We reject these contentions. In People v. Lang (1989) 49 Cal.3d 991, 264 Cal.Rptr. 386, 782 P.2d 627, we held that in the absence of a request, the trial court is under no duty to give [a limiting] instruction at the penalty phase in regard to evidence received at the guilt phase. ( Id. at p. 1039, 264 Cal.Rptr. 386, 782 P.2d 627; accord, People v. Zapien, supra, 4 Cal.4th at p. 993, 17 Cal.Rptr.2d 122, 846 P.2d 704.) Here, with no request, the trial court had no obligation to instruct the jury not to consider evidence supporting the adjudicated murders in determining whether defendant had committed the unadjudicated crimes. Moreover, Evidence Code section 1101, subdivision (b), allows for the admission of evidence of other crimes committed by a defendant to show factors such as motive, intent, identity, or absence of mistake or accident with respect to a charged crime. The prosecutor's penalty phase argument, as highlighted by defendant, focused on aspects of the killings of Weber and Duarte that bore a substantial similarity to the killing of defendant's mother: In each instance, defendant was motivated by financial gain and immediately set out to create a false alibi. Because the jury properly could consider the adjudicated murders for such purposes in determining whether defendant had committed the unadjudicated crimes, no limiting instruction on propensity evidence was warranted, and defense counsel thus cannot be faulted for not requesting one or not objecting to the prosecutor's argument.