Opinion ID: 1351576
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: Consideration of Invalid Witness-killing Special Circumstances

Text: (16) Defendant contends that the court committed reversible error by allowing the jury to consider the invalid witness-killing special-circumstance findings. For the reasons stated in part III, ante, we agree that error occurred. But we cannot agree that reversal is required. Certainly, the error here is not prejudicial per se, but rather is subject to harmless-error analysis. Whether it violates state law only or implicates the United States Constitution as well is immaterial. It is harmless under both the reasonable possibility test of People v. Brown (1988) 46 Cal.3d 432, 446-448 [250 Cal. Rptr. 604, 758 P.2d 1135], and the reasonable doubt test of Chapman v. California (1967) 386 U.S. 18, 24 [17 L.Ed.2d 705, 710, 87 S.Ct. 824, 24 A.L.R.3d 1065]. Although we presume that the jurors [followed their instructions and] considered the invalid special-circumstance findings independent of their underlying facts, we cannot conclude that they could reasonably have given them any significant independent weight. ( People v. Hamilton (1988) 46 Cal.3d 123, 151 [249 Cal. Rptr. 320, 756 P.2d 1348].)