Opinion ID: 2623326
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Argument unrelated to statutory factors

Text: In reviewing the evidence for the jury during closing argument, the prosecutor asserted that defendant's statements to an arresting officer in 1980 showed him to be con-wise and manipulative. The prosecutor also recalled for the jury the officer's testimony that after he had noticed track marks on defendant's arms and started to examine them, defendant's personality changed from cooperative and passive to abrasive. The prosecutor then characterized defendant's testimony at the guilt phase as an attempt to manipulate the jury, stating, We've got a man, ladies and gentlemen, who has been violent and ..., when held accountable for his conduct, has tried to manipulate the system. Defendant asserts the prosecutor's argument was an attack on his personality and character that was irrelevant to any of the statutory factors in aggravation and therefore improper under the reasoning of People v. Boyd, supra, 38 Cal.3d 762, 215 Cal.Rptr. 1, 700 P.2d 782, and violative of his federal constitutional rights. Because defense counsel neither objected to the prosecutor's remarks nor sought an admonition, defendant's claim of error is not preserved for appellate review. ( People v. Smithey, supra, 20 Cal.4th at p. 998, 86 Cal.Rptr.2d 243, 978 P.2d 1171.) In any event, the claim lacks merit. Section 190.3 provides: [The jury] shall impose a sentence of death if [it] concludes that the aggravating circumstances outweigh the mitigating circumstances. If [it] determines that the mitigating circumstances outweigh the aggravating circumstances [it] shall impose a sentence of confinement in the state prison for a term of life without the possibility of parole. Thus, the law requires the jury to decide the appropriate penalty by a process of weighing the specific factors listed in the statute. ( People v. Boyd, supra, 38 Cal.3d at p. 773, 215 Cal. Rptr. 1, 700 P.2d 782; see ง 190.3, factors (a)-(k) [listing the relevant considerations].) Because section 190.3, factor (k) refers to any other circumstance that extenuates the gravity of the crime rather than to evidence enhancing it, evidence of a defendant's background and good character is admissible to extenuate the crime, but the prosecutor may not offer evidence of a defendant's bad character under this factor as part of its case-in-aggravation at the penalty phase. ( People v. Boyd, supra, at pp. 774-776, 215 Cal.Rptr. 1, 700 P.2d 782; see also People v. Edelbacher (1989) 47 Cal.3d 983, 1033, 254 Cal.Rptr. 586, 766 P.2d 1.) As we explained in Boyd, [e]vidence of defendant's background, character, or conduct which is not probative of any specific listed factor would have no tendency to prove or disprove a fact of consequence to the determination of the action, and is therefore irrelevant to aggravation. ( People v. Boyd, supra, at p. 774, 215 Cal.Rptr. 1, 700 P.2d 782.) But this restriction affects only the admission of evidence. At the penalty phase of a capital trial, a prosecutor is permitted to argue any reasonable inferences from properly admitted evidence of a defendant's prior violent crime, even if such inferences relate to the defendant's character as revealed in the prior violent crime itself or in its surrounding circumstances. ( People v. Avena, supra, 13 Cal.4th at p. 439, 53 Cal.Rptr.2d 301, 916 P.2d 1000.) Here, the prosecutor did not argue that defendant's character was, in itself, an aggravating factor. Thus, we reject this claim of prosecutorial misconduct in argument.