Opinion ID: 1408550
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: The Special Circumstance of Murder for Financial Gain.

Text: The 1977 death penalty law included a special circumstance of murder for hire, defined in the following language: The murder was intentional and was carried out pursuant to an agreement by the person who committed the murder to accept valuable consideration for the act of murder from any person other than the victim. (Former § 190.2, subd. (a).) As was frequently the case, the 1978 initiative replaced the precise language of the 1977 act with vague and broad generalities. [10] In this instance, it rewrote the special circumstance to read: The murder was intentional and carried out for financial gain. (§ 190.2, subd. (a)(1).) The trial court instructed the jury in the statutory language. Read broadly, the 1978 language would create a large area of overlap between this special circumstance and that of felony murder (§ 190.2, subd. (a)(17)), since most robberies, as well as many burglaries, kidnapings and arsons, are committed for financial gain. Defense counsel maintains that although the 1978 law expanded the scope of the special circumstance beyond murder for hire, [11] it should still be limited to those cases in which the victim's death is essential to obtaining the financial gain, such as a killing to obtain an inheritance or life insurance proceeds. Defendant cites a decision of the Nebraska Supreme Court construing an aggravating factor of murder for pecuniary gain to apply (1) to the hired gun, (2) to the hirers of the gun, and (3) to murder motivated primarily by a desire for pecuniary gain as in the case of a murder of an insured by the beneficiary of a life insurance policy for the purpose of obtaining the proceeds, or the murder of a testator of a legatee or devisee to secure a legacy or a devise. The Nebraska court concluded that here ... we do not consider the murder was committed for a pecuniary gain even though the result could possibly have been to enable [defendant] to keep the proceeds of the robbery. We think it is not reasonable to construe the definitions in such a manner as to make them overlap and make the same identical facts constitute two aggravating circumstances. ( State v. Rust (1977) 197 Neb. 528 [250 N.W.2d 867, 874].) [12] We write with little to guide us in the construction of the financial gain special circumstance. No legislative history illumines the adoption of this special circumstance. The ballot arguments and other materials concerning the 1978 initiative do not address the subject. (11) In this context, we believe the court should construe special circumstance provisions to minimize those cases in which multiple circumstances will apply to the same conduct, thereby reducing the risk that multiple findings on special circumstances will prejudice the defendant. Such a limiting construction will not prejudice the prosecution, since there will remain at least one special circumstance  either financial gain or felony murder  applicable in virtually all cases in which the defendant killed to obtain money or other property. We adopt a limiting construction under which the financial gain special circumstance applies only when the victim's death is the consideration for, or an essential prerequisite to, the financial gain sought by the defendant. Since the present case does not fall within the special circumstance as so limited, the trial court erred in submitting that special circumstance to the jury.