Opinion ID: 1133414
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Instruction on aggravating and mitigating circumstances

Text: The trial court read to the jury CALJIC No. 8.85 (1988 rev.), the standard instruction describing the aggravating and mitigating circumstances set forth in section 190.3. The court refused two of defendant's instructions that would have told the jury that aggravating factors are limited to those listed in the instruction, and directed it to disregard any other facts or circumstances as a basis for imposing the death penalty. Defendant contends that CALJIC No. 8.85 given without further elaboration is unconstitutionally vague, because it fails to limit the jury to considering only specified factors in aggravation and because it permits a prosecutor to argue nonstatutory matters as factors in aggravation. [12] Citing the Fifth, Sixth, Eighth, and Fourteenth Amendments to the federal Constitution, defendant argues that the unmodified instruction allowed the penalty decision process to proceed in an arbitrary, capricious, death-biased and unreviewable manner. Not so. Recently, in People v. Musselwhite (1998) 17 Cal.4th 1216, 1266, 74 Cal.Rptr.2d 212, 954 P.2d 475, we rejected a similar vagueness challenge to CALJIC No. 8.85 based on the instruction's failure to specify which of the enumerated sentencing factors were aggravating and which were mitigating. There we characterized the defendant's argument as resting on a misunderstanding of what might be described as the `architecture' of California's death penalty scheme. (17 Cal.4th at p. 1266, 74 Cal.Rptr.2d 212, 954 P.2d 475.) Likewise, defendant's argument here displays a fundamental misunderstanding of the differing constitutional requirements for the narrowing and sentence-selection aspects of a state's capital sentencing law. ( Ibid.; see People v. Bacigalupo (1993) 6 Cal.4th 457, 467-470, 476, 24 Cal.Rptr.2d 808, 862 P.2d 808: It would be inconsistent with the purpose and function of the section 190.3 sentencing factors to require those factors to satisfy the Eighth Amendment requirements for the narrowing aspect of a death penalty scheme.) We also reject several constitutional challenges directed at CALJIC No. 8.85 that are essentially identical to challenges we have previously rejected with regard to California's death penalty law itself. Thus, the jury instruction is not unconstitutional for failing to exclude nonstatutory, unspecified aggravating factors as a basis for the death penalty. ( People v. Rodriguez (1986) 42 Cal.3d 730, 777, 230 Cal.Rptr: 667, 726 P.2d 113; accord, People v. Hawthorne (1992) 4 Cal.4th 43, 80, 14 Cal.Rptr.2d 133, 841 P.2d 118.) Nor need the instruction identify particular sentencing factors because their aggravating or mitigating nature is clear. ( People v. Frye, supra, 18 Cal.4th 894, 1026, 77 Cal.Rptr.2d 25, 959 P.2d 183; People v. Ray (1996) 13 Cal.4th 313, 359, 52 Cal.Rptr.2d 296, 914 P.2d 846.) The aggravating factors described in CALJIC No. 8.85 are not unconstitutionally vague or arbitrary. ( People v. Arias (1996) 13 Cal.4th 92, 187-188, 51 Cal.Rptr.2d 770, 913 P.2d 980; People v. Cudjo (1993) 6 Cal.4th 585, 637, 25 Cal.Rptr.2d 390, 863 P.2d 635; People v. Bacigalupo, supra, 6 Cal.4th 457, 478-479, 24 Cal.Rptr.2d 808, 862 P.2d 808.) The Fifth, Eighth, and Fourteenth Amendments to the federal Constitution do not require the jury to be instructed to find the existence of aggravating circumstances or the appropriateness of the death penalty beyond a reasonable doubt. ( People v. Frye, supra, at p. 1029, 77 Cal.Rptr.2d 25, 959 P.2d 183; People v. Rodriguez, supra, at pp. 777-779, 230 Cal. Rptr. 667, 726 P.2d 113.) The trial court did not err in declining to require written jury findings that aggravating factors substantially outweigh mitigating factors or that death was the appropriate penalty. ( People v. Kipp, supra, 18 Cal.4th 349, 381, 75 Cal. Rptr.2d 716, 956 P.2d 1169; People v. Clark, supra, 5 Cal.4th 950, 1040, 22 Cal.Rptr.2d 689, 857 P.2d 1099.) Furthermore, the trial court had no obligation to modify the instruction to delete inapplicable aggravating and mitigating factors. ( People v. Ramos, supra, 15 Cal.4th 1133, 1183, 64 Cal.Rptr.2d 892, 938 P.2d 950; People v. Cain (1995) 10 Cal.4th 1, 80, 40 Cal.Rptr.2d 481, 892 P.2d 1224.) [13]