Opinion ID: 2624305
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: Double Counting of Johnson's Testimony

Text: Defendant claims that Johnson's testimony that defendant had solicited him to murder Elaine was used to support two aggravating factors: both section 190.3, factor (a), the circumstances of the crime and factor (b), prior violent criminal activity. He contends that such double counting amounts to reversible error, violating statutory law, section 190.3, and the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution. We disagree any such error occurred here. Factors (a) and (b) of section 190.3 refer to distinct, nonoverlapping categories, the former to the circumstances of the present crime that have made the defendant eligible for the death penalty, the latter to other violent criminal activity. ( People v. Visciotti (1992) 2 Cal.4th 1, 76 [5 Cal.Rptr.2d 495, 825 P.2d 388].) We have suggested that improper prosecutorial argument that invites the jury to consider the same evidence in support of both factors could lead the jury to overemphasize the importance of that evidence, resulting in penalty phase error. ( Ibid. ) There was no such improper prosecutorial argument in the present case. The prosecutor only used the Johnson testimony in connection with one aggravating factor, section 190.3, factor (b), to prove that defendant had engaged in an unadjudicated violent criminal act in attempting to solicit Johnson to kill Elaine. The prosecutor did not mention the Johnson testimony in connection with factor (a). It is true that the prosecution argued to the second penalty phase jury, which had not participated in the guilt phase of the trial, that Johnson's testimony should negate any lingering doubt that defendant did in fact commit the murders of which another jury had convicted him. But section 190.3, factor (a) is concerned with those circumstances that make a murder especially aggravated, and therefore make a defendant more culpable and deserving of the ultimate penalty. (See People v. Jenkins (2000) 22 Cal.4th 900, 1052-1053 [95 Cal.Rptr.2d 377, 997 P.2d 1044].) While the prosecutor in the present case did use the Johnson testimony to confirm that defendant had committed the murders, he did not suggest defendant's unsuccessful solicitation of Johnson to murder Elaine made her murder more aggravated under factor (a). Therefore, such dual use of the Johnson testimony did not amount to double counting of that testimony to support two separate aggravating factors.