Opinion ID: 1281505
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 23

Heading: Incompetence of Counsel at the Guilt and Penalty Phases

Text: Defendant claims he was deprived of the effective assistance of trial counsel in several respects. First, he cites as incompetence trial counsel's failure to challenge the representative adequacy of the venire, particularly with respect to alleged underrepresentation of Hispanics in the venire and on the jury ultimately chosen. Second, defendant complains that counsel failed to object to improper argument by the prosecution. Third, he complains that defense counsel failed to investigate and present an insanity defense or at least present at the guilt phase evidence concerning defendant's troubled family background. Finally, defendant complains that his counsel failed to take effective issue with penalty phase instructions concerning whether aggravating factors outweighed mitigating and whether the death penalty was mandatory. None of his contentions have merit on the record before us. (42) Defendant has the right to the reasonably competent assistance of counsel acting as a diligent advocate. Even where counsel's decision is a tactical one, defendant has a right to that action not being taken without adequate investigation and consideration of applicable law. ( People v. Ledesma (1987) 43 Cal.3d 171, 215 [233 Cal. Rptr. 404, 729 P.2d 839].) In a claim of incompetence of counsel, it is defendant's burden to establish that trial counsel not only fell below this standard but also that his acts or omissions resulted in withdrawal of a potentially meritorious defense or it is reasonably probable a determination more favorable to defendant would have resulted absent counsel's failings. ( Id. at pp. 216-218; see also People v. Fosselman (1983) 33 Cal.3d 572, 583-584 [189 Cal. Rptr. 855, 659 P.2d 1144]; People v. Pope (1979) 23 Cal.3d 412, 425 [152 Cal. Rptr. 732, 590 P.2d 859, 2 A.L.R.4th 1].) (43) Defendant has manifestly failed to establish incompetence of counsel under these rules. As to counsel's failure to attack the ethnic composition of the jury venire, the appellate record in this case does not, as we have noted above, necessarily establish improper underrepresentation of Hispanics. [37] As for defendant's complaint that counsel failed to object to improper arguments by the prosecutor, he contends that the prosecutor repeatedly made arguments based upon matters outside the record and not in evidence. As he does not specify what those matters were, we need not address the claim further. (44) He contends counsel should have objected to prejudicial and unwarranted remarks about the desire of the victims' family to see that Hernandez received the death penalty. While under other circumstances such a contention might require us to consider whether irrelevant material had affected a capital sentencing (see e.g., Booth v. Maryland (1987) 482 U.S. 496 [96 L.Ed.2d 440, 107 S.Ct. 2529]), the remarks in this case, which occurred during the prosecutor's argument to the jury at the penalty phase, informed the jury that victims do not have a role in determining what the penalty should be. Nor do we conclude the prosecutor was using some sort of ruse to bring the matter to the jury's attention while appearing not to do so. The statements in question occurred as the prosecutor attempted to impress on the jurors that they alone would decide penalty. Hence he told them the defendant's preference either for death or life without possibility of parole was not determinative. He stated: ... We don't let an individual choose their punishment. [ถ] Also, you did not hear testimony by the โ we can't bring victims, but the next of kin of the victims as to what the penalty should be, because we don't let that influence the decision. These remarks are even less significant than those we recently found harmless in Ghent. (See Ghent, supra, 43 Cal.3d at pp. 771-772.) Defendant also contends counsel should have objected when the prosecutor argued defendant's age could be considered as an aggravating factor. This matter has been discussed at length above and we need not reiterate our conclusions here beyond saying that the prosecutor did not urge that defendant's youth was aggravating and the handling of this factor could not have affected the outcome of this trial. (45) Defendant's third complaint that counsel failed to investigate and present an insanity defense is similarly rebutted by the record. Defendant at the penalty phase presented testimony from two psychologists as to defendant's alleged personality deficits. Twice during his arguments to the jury at the end of this phase he discussed this evidence finally stating: I am not trying to say, again, that excuses what he did. If I had thought that it excused what he did, then I think I would have raised the defense of insanity, and I didn't do that. You would have decided that issue along with the other issues that you had to decide. [ถ] I didn't raise that issue. I am not trying to say that he is insane in the legal sense or anything else. [ถ] What I am saying is that he is, nevertheless, severely and substantially emotionally and mentally impaired and that what we don't do in this country is we don't kill people who are sick people. We just don't do it. Defendant has failed to establish that there was other evidence of mental disease or defect which counsel did not present or which would have been relevant to the guilt or penalty phase. He thus fails to establish incompetence of counsel on this point. As for defendant's fourth complaint that counsel failed to take effective issue with the penalty phase instructions, no more need be said than that we have previously concluded any error in those instructions could not have misled the jury in this case. Defendant's claim of incompetence of counsel may not, on this record, be sustained.