Opinion ID: 2633651
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 6

Heading: Failure to instruct on the relationship of mental disease or defect to premeditation and deliberation

Text: The jury was instructed pursuant to a modified version of former CALJIC No. 3.36 (now CALJIC No. 3.32), as follows: Evidence has been received regarding a mental disease or mental defect or mental disorder of the defendant at the time of the offenses charged in counts one and two and in the lesser included offense of voluntary manslaughter. You may consider such evidence solely for the purpose of determining whether or not the defendant actually formed the mental state which is an element of the crimes charged in the information and the crime of voluntary manslaughter. Defendant contends the trial court erred by failing to identify the specific mental state or states  namely premeditation and deliberation  to which defendant's mental health evidence was relevant. Defendant points out that the use note accompanying the standard instruction directs the trial judge to specify the mental state or intent required in each specific count. (Use Note to CALJIC No. 3.36 (1987 rev.) (4th ed.1979).) He contends the trial court exacerbated the error by failing to give CALJIC No. 3.31.5, the instruction on concurrence of act and mental state, which would have specified that the necessary mental state required for first degree murder was premeditation and deliberation. He argues the instructions as a whole would have led the jury to believe it could not consider the defense mental health evidence in determining whether the killing of Clark was premeditated and deliberate. [27] We disagree. [28] We previously have rejected claims that a trial court erroneously failed to identify premeditation and deliberation as a mental state to which evidence of mental disease or defect was relevant, in cases where the trial court either explained that premeditation and deliberation were mental states necessary for a conviction of first degree murder ( People v. Musselwhite (1998) 17 Cal.4th 1216, 1247-1249, 74 Cal.Rptr.2d 212, 954 P.2d 475; People v. Jones (1991) 53 Cal.3d 1115, 1145, 282 Cal.Rptr. 465, 811 P.2d 757) or instructed that `the mental state required is included in the definition of the crime charged' ( People v. Smithey (1999) 20 Cal.4th 936, 988, 86 Cal.Rptr.2d 243, 978 P.2d 1171). We also have rejected a similar claim regarding the instruction relating voluntary intoxication to mental state. ( People v. Castillo (1997) 16 Cal.4th 1009, 1014, fn. 2, 68 Cal.Rptr.2d 648, 945 P.2d 1197 [pinpoint instruction relating voluntary intoxication to premeditation and deliberation not required where jury was fully instructed on first degree premeditated murder and also instructed that the requisite mental states would be defined `elsewhere in these instructions']). In the foregoing cases, in light of full instructions defining first degree murder including an explanation of premeditation and deliberation, we concluded a reasonable jury would have understood that the requisite mental states (as set forth in the definitions of the crimes) were the same `mental states' that could be considered in connection with the evidence of defendant's mental disease, defect, or disorder. ( People v. Smithey, supra, 20 Cal.4th at p. 989, 86 Cal.Rptr.2d 243, 978 P.2d 1171.) Although, in contrast to the cases cited above, the jury neither was informed that premeditation and deliberation were mental states, nor told that the mental state required for each crime was included in the definition of that crime, the instructions as a whole nonetheless adequately informed the jury it could consider defendant's evidence of mental disease or defect in deciding whether he premeditated and deliberated the killing of Clark. As we explained in People v. Castillo, supra, 16 Cal.4th at page 1017, 68 Cal.Rptr.2d 648, 945 P.2d 1197: Premeditation and deliberation are clearly mental states; no reasonable juror would assume otherwise. Moreover, they refer to the quality of the intent to kill. Similarly here, the instruction on first degree murder fully explained the concepts of premeditation and deliberation. The jury would have understood that they are mental states. By relating [mental disease or defect] to mental state, the [challenged] instruction necessarily directed the jury's attention to evidence of [mental disease or defect] as it related to premeditation and deliberation. ( People v. Castillo, supra, 16 Cal.4th at p. 1017, 68 Cal.Rptr.2d 648, 945 P.2d 1197.) Moreover, defense counsel's argument reinforced the notion inherent in the instructions that premeditation and deliberation are mental states. Several times in argument, defendant's counsel equated the concept of mental state with premeditation and deliberation. Counsel argued the prosecution had to prove mental state beyond a reasonable doubt, and then asked the jury to consider whether the prosecution had proven a state of premeditation and deliberation beyond a reasonable doubt. Counsel also asked rhetorically whether defendant killed Clark with the high level of mental state of weighing considerations for and against? Under all the circumstances, no reasonable juror would have assumed premeditation and deliberation were not mental states as that term was used in the instruction relating defendant's evidence of mental disease or defect to the mental state necessary for the charged crimes. (Cf. People v. Castillo, supra, 16 Cal.4th at p. 1017, 68 Cal. Rptr.2d 648, 945 P.2d 1197.)