Opinion ID: 1171490
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: Refusal to allow defense counsel to reopen examination of Vivian Cercy.

Text: Vivian Cercy testified at the penalty phase regarding her observations on the night of the murders. The defense hoped her testimony would raise in the jurors' minds a lingering doubt as to defendant's guilt, which might be sufficient to induce them not to recommend the death penalty. She testified on cross-examination that she had had several meetings with defense counsel, but had not discussed her proposed penalty phase testimony in great detail. On redirect, she recalled recently visiting the crime scene with defense counsel and discussing her observations with them. She described how her visit to the scene had caused her to alter some of her previous testimony. After Cercy finished testifying, before the close of the penalty phase evidence, the jury submitted several questions raised by her testimony. [19] The second of these questions, and pertinent portions of the in-chambers colloquy it generated, are as follows: The Court: `The witness today, on first cross-examination recalled in order the different recent encounters with Attorney Cercy  I think we all agree he means Chaffee, not Cercy  how is it she didn't recall visiting the site with him?' My reaction to that question, that is really a question of trying to rehabilitate. It sounded like there's confusion in the jury's mind that needs to be clarified, but a question as to whether you should be able to rehabilitate her because the jury has a question regarding her memory, I don't think that comes within the proper ambit of a proper question for the jury to present. But you said you wanted to make an offer? Mr. Chaffee [defense counsel]: I would request the court's permission to reopen and ask her some questions about that. Because the testimony that was elicited from her by Mr. Anderson [the prosecutor] on direct, does not constitute the sum total of all the contacts she has had with me and Susan Walsh since she arrived here. My offer of proof would be, she has seen one or the other, or both of us, almost every day since she first arrived here. There have been many visits. And I do not believe that her omitting, when she was first questioned by Mr. Anderson, the fact that she went out to the site with Susan Walsh and me on a particular date, which I can't even recall at the moment, was willful on her part or shows that she forgot or anything like that. The Court: That's fine. And that's perhaps something that you may be able to argue. But the proper purpose of allowing the jury questions is to allow them anything where there is confusion or something that they feel it is a question that needed to be answered. And sometimes, if we both agree upon it and ask the question, or we say it is irrelevant, and we're not going to let that be asked. .... .... .... .... .... .... .... Question number two is really a question whether you should be allowed, because the jury has some doubt about the memory or veracity, to be allowed to rehabilitate because of the jury raising the question. And the court's ruling, that is not the purpose of jury questions. And I will not allow that question to be asked or that subject to be covered. Defense counsel requested leeway to clarify Cercy's testimony, noting that he omitted to ask questions for that purpose on redirect. The court asked whether he proposed to ask Cercy how was it she did not recall visiting the site with counsel; counsel said he did not. The court ruled that any other question would be improper, because that was the question the jury had asked. (33) Defendant contends that the trial court erred in denying permission to reopen Cercy's examination. He asserts that the trial judge must have believed, erroneously, that he lacked discretion to do so. He points out that Evidence Code section 778 gives the trial court general discretion to recall a witness, without excluding situations involving rehabilitation of a witness. [20] Defendant's point lacks merit. The trial court's remarks reflect not a belief that it lacked discretion to recall Cercy, but rather a determination that the purpose for which counsel sought to recall her was inappropriate. Its ruling was an exercise, not an abdication, of its statutory discretion. This case is therefore distinguishable from People v. Raven (1955) 44 Cal.2d 523 [282 P.2d 866], in which we held it error to refuse a defense request to recall a prosecution witness in order to lay a foundation for impeachment, when the trial court believed it was powerless to permit further cross-examination of the witness unless the prosecution reopened its case. ( Id. at pp. 525-526.) The court's exercise of its discretion was sound. The testimony defense counsel proposed to elicit on recall  that she had had many meetings with counsel  would not have enhanced Cercy's credibility. Indeed, it could have cast further doubt on her claim that she did not discuss the case with counsel to any great extent. Nor would it have clarified the other inconsistencies in her testimony. Defendant fails to demonstrate error in the trial court's ruling.