Opinion ID: 2633881
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: Attempted Rape as the Basis of a Special Circumstance Finding

Text: Defendant contends that, as a matter of California law, there can be no special circumstance finding under section 190.2, subdivision (a)(17)(C) predicated upon a killing that occurs in conjunction with an attempted rape. He argues that because once the victim has been killed it is legally impossible thereafter to commit rape (see Kelly, supra, 1 Cal.4th at p. 526, 3 Cal.Rptr.2d 677, 822 P.2d 385), no killing during the course of an attempted rape can further the purpose of completing the crime; such a killing, in fact, prevents completion of the offense. Accordingly, he claims, the killing cannot be said to have been committed in order to advance the independent felonious purpose of attempted rape. (See People v. Morris (1988) 46 Cal.3d 1, 21, 249 Cal.Rptr. 119, 756 P.2d 843, disapproved on other grounds in In re Sassounian (1995) 9 Cal.4th 535, 543-544, fn. 5, 37 Cal.Rptr.2d 446, 887 P.2d 527.) Defendant is mistaken. The independent felonious purpose rule that we have discussed in Morris and many other cases is a mechanism for ensuring that a felony-murder special circumstance finding is based upon proof that the defendant intended to commit the underlying felony separately from forming an intent to kill the victim; that is, the felony was not merely an afterthought to the murder, as when, for example, the defendant intends to murder the victim and after doing so takes his or her wallet for the purpose of making identification of the body more difficult. (See Raley, supra, 2 Cal.4th at p. 902, 8 Cal.Rptr.2d 678, 830 P.2d 712.) This does not equate, as defendant argues, with a converse rule that if the defendant has an independent felonious purpose, the killing necessarily must further the goal of committing the underlying crime if the special circumstance is to apply. (See People v. Berryman (1993) 6 Cal.4th 1048, 1089-1090, 25 Cal.Rptr.2d 867, 864 P.2d 40, overruled on other grounds in People v. Hill (1998) 17 Cal.4th 800, 823, fn. 1, 72 Cal.Rptr.2d 656, 952 P.2d 673 ( Hill ) [the felony-murder special circumstance does not require a strict `causal' or `temporal' relationship between the `felony' and the `murder' and extends even to the situation in which the `murder was committed while the defendant was engaged in ... the immediate flight after committing' the felony]; People v. Horning (2004) 34 Cal.4th 871, 907, 22 Cal.Rptr.3d 305, 102 P.3d 228 [concluding our cases have established only one requirementthat the evidence establish the felony was not merely incidental to the murderand, therefore, the trial court's failure to instruct the jury that it must also find that the murder was committed `in order to carry out or advance' the commission of the felony was not erroneous].) Therefore, although intentionally killing the victim during an attempted rape ultimately might thwart, in the legal sense, the perpetrator's goal of committing a rape, this circumstance does not mean the murder was not committed while the defendant was engaged in ... the ... attempted commission of ... [¶] ... [¶] ... Rape, which is what the statute requires. (§ 190.2, subd. (a)(17)(C).) [40]