Opinion ID: 2551468
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 11

Heading: Denying Motion to Reopen to Show Confinement Arrangement

Text: Defendant claims that the prosecution committed misconduct by permitting Rafael Mendoza Lopez and Juan Manuel Meza to be housed in the same module of a protective custody unit once Mendoza had recanted his testimony. He asserts that the prosecution, as revealed by a sheriffs department memorandum, affirmatively authorized the two to associate with each other, giving them the opportunity to confer on and align testimony adverse to him. And he claims that the trial court committed error under state law by denying his motion to reopen the guilt phase case to present evidence of the confinement arrangement. He asserts that his rights under state law were violated, as well as a right he discerns under the Sixth and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution to present a defense, and his right to a reliable determination of guilt and penalty under the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments thereto. The pertinent facts are these: As mentioned, on Monday, September 26, 1988, the prosecution informed the trial court that Mendoza had recanted his exculpatory testimony on the previous Friday, and that the prosecution had tape-recorded a version of the recantation on Saturday and made it available to defense counsel just as the proceedings were resuming on that Monday. For his safety, Mendoza was moved to a protective custody module in San Diego County's South Bay district after telling the authorities he would recant. Meza was already in that module. On October 3, 1988, the parties finished presenting their evidence and the trial court instructed the jury on the applicable law. The next day, before counsel made their arguments to the jury, defense counsel announced that because of the sheriffs failure to provide Mendoza's complete inmate housing records despite repeated requests, they did not obtain records for the current year until after they had rested their case. The 1988 records revealed that Mendoza had been housed with Meza. In response, the prosecution stated that Mendoza's evidence had been memorialized on tape before he was moved to the same module as Meza, and that defendant had heard the tape before Mendoza testified, allowing him to cross-examine on any discrepancies whether or not he knew that Mendoza and Meza were in the same facility. (In addition, the record shows that Meza completed his testimony on the afternoon of September 7, 1988, long before being housed with Mendoza.) The prosecutor also argued that neither witness had an interest in conforming his testimony to the other's. The prosecution explained why the two witnesses were housed together. The government needed to place both men in the South Bay protective custody module because downtown San Diego's protective custody facility was not secure enough and the El Cajon jail lacked protective custody housing. The prosecution explained the sheriffs department memorandum by stating that it needed to inform the sheriff the two men did not pose a danger to each other if they saw each otheri.e., there will be no harm that we can perceive of that kind of a contact coming about. In response, defense counsel argued that some of Mendoza's rebuttal testimony touched on matters not covered in his taped statement, and that there were jails in El Cajon and downtown San Diego in which one of the two men could have been placed. She urged that the government's failure to disclose the two witnesses' housing arrangement constituted misconduct under state law, and violated defendant's due process right to be provided favorable material evidence (e.g., Kyles v. Whitley, supra, 514 U.S. 419, 115 S.Ct. 1555, 131 L.Ed.2d 490; United States v. Bagley, supra, 473 U.S. 667, 105 S.Ct. 3375, 87 L.Ed.2d 481; see ante, 96 Cal.Rptr.2d at p. 717, 1 P.3d at p. 35). In addition to his motion to reopen his case, defendant moved for a mistrial with or without prejudice, or a lesser sanction. The trial court denied the motions. It ruled: The court has no facts before it to show the scheme of the People to procure false testimony. In point of fact this record would seem to speak to just the opposite. The taping occurred well before this memo [by the sheriffs department]. The reasons given for the placement certainly make sense in terms of protecting inmates. It further ruled, in response to defendant's request for clarification, that the sheriffs document was irrelevant. Defendant is not entitled to relief on the grounds urged on appeal, or on the ground urged at trial of withholding favorable material evidence. We review for abuse of discretion a trial court's ruling on a motion to reopen a criminal case to permit the introduction of additional evidence. ( People v. Marshall, supra, 13 Cal.4th 799, 836, 55 Cal. Rptr.2d 347, 919 P.2d 1280.) We find none here. Nor do we find any prosecutorial misconduct. Defendant could produce no evidence that the prosecution enabled Mendoza and Meza to confer and tailor their testimony, or that of Mendoza, or that Mendoza's testimony was altered as a result of his lodging in the South Bay jail. Nor was defendant denied any right to present a defense, or more precisely, evidence relevant to the theory of his defense. Such a right does not require the court [to] allow an unlimited inquiry into collateral matters, which this surely was; rather, the proffered evidence must have more than slight relevanc[e]. (Ibid.) Finally, because informing defendant of the two men's confinement arrangement would not have created a reasonable probability of a different outcome, we discern no violation of the due process right to be provided with favorable material evidence. Nor do we discern the denial of any right to a reliable guilt and penalty determination. The motion for a mistrial, with or without prejudice, was also properly denied. In People v. Welch (1999) 20 Cal.4th 701, 749, 85 Cal.Rptr.2d 203, 976 P.2d 754, we reiterated that we review such a ruling for an abuse of discretion, and we implied that a motion for mistrial should be granted only when `a party's chances of receiving a fair trial have been irreparably damaged.'  We apply that standard here. (Accord, People v. Bines (1997) 15 Cal.4th 997, 1038, 64 Cal.Rptr.2d 594, 938 P.2d 388; People v. Haskett (1982) 30 Cal.3d 841, 854, 180 Cal.Rptr. 640, 640 P.2d 776.) As shown by our discussion above, there was no irreparable damage to defendant's chance of having a fair trial: in the absence of any evidence of collusion, the inmates' housing arrangement was irrelevant.