Opinion ID: 2584893
Heading Depth: 5
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Questions Concerning Investigator's Opinions of Defendant's Credibility and Guilt

Text: Defendant contends the prosecutor committed misconduct by asking Investigator Pina several questions concerning his opinion of the credibility of defendant's statements about the crime and whether or not defendant was guilty of the crimes charged. Of the approximately eight instances of alleged misconduct defendant raises on appeal, he objected at trial to only two. As to the first of these, the trial court sustained defendant's objection to the question and answer concerning Pina's opinions about defendant's display of emotions during the interviews and struck the answer, thus eliminating any possible prejudice from that alleged instance of misconduct on the part of the prosecutor. As to the second alleged instance of misconduct to which defendant objected, which is the last in time of the eight alleged instances of improper questioning, the trial court overruled defendant's objection to a question concerning Pina's opinion as to defendant's motivation for writing an account of the murder in his manuscript. We see no evidence that objections to the remaining allegedly improper questions would have been futile, nor was this a situation where the prosecutor's alleged misconduct was so pervasive that defendant's failure to object in each instance should be excused. We therefore conclude that defendant forfeited all of his unobjected-to claims of misconduct. In any event, even considering the merits of these two preserved allegations of misconduct in combination with all of defendant's forfeited allegations, no claim would warrant reversal of the judgment. The questions and answers that defendant challenges can be distilled to two opinions Pina expressed: (1) that defendant's statements to the police and in his manuscript were untruthful attempts to shift blame away from himself; and (2) that defendant, not Hilda Riggs, shot and killed Jamie Bowie in order to rob her. Even assuming these opinions were improperly admitted (see People v. Melton (1988) 44 Cal.3d 713, 744 [244 Cal.Rptr. 867, 750 P.2d 741] [opinion testimony from a witness with no personal knowledge of the events regarding the veracity of another witness's statements regarding those events is inadmissible because such testimony is speculative]; but see People v. Padilla (1995) 11 Cal.4th 891, 946-947 [47 Cal.Rptr.2d 426, 906 P.2d 388] [declining to decide whether this aspect of Melton survived Prop. 8]), we nonetheless conclude that any misconduct in this regard was not prejudicial. Investigator Pina's testimony that he believed defendant was guilty as charged and was untruthful when he denied responsibility for the crimes did not present any evidence to the jury that it would not have already inferred from the fact that Pina had investigated the case and that defendant had been charged with the crimes. There was no implication from the questions or answers that Pina's opinions were based upon evidence that had not been presented to the jury. (Cf. People v. Frye (1998) 18 Cal.4th 894, 975 [77 Cal.Rptr.2d 25, 959 P.2d 183] [A prosecutor may not give a personal opinion or belief as to the defendant's guilt if it will suggest to the jury the prosecutor has information bearing on guilt that has not been disclosed at trial.].) In addition, we see nothing in the record that would lead us to conclude that the jury was likely to disregard the instructions it received concerning its duty to decide the issues of credibility and guilt based upon its own assessment of the evidence, not the opinions of any witness. The jury's exposure to the unsurprising opinions of the investigating officer that he believed the person charged with the crimes had committed them, and was untruthful in denying his guilt, could not have influenced the verdictespecially in light of the overwhelming evidence against defendant. To the extent that there was any misconduct in eliciting these opinions from Investigator Pina, under the state standard there is no likelihood that without the misconduct defendant would have achieved a better result; under the federal standard, the trial was not infected with such unfairness as to result in a denial of due process.