Opinion ID: 1163779
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: instructions to the jury are free of reversible error

Text: Defendant [ ] next urges the trial court committed reversible error in its instructions to the jury. Such allegations lack merit. Defendant first argues the second degree murder instruction relating to intent was improper. He notes the trial court gave both CALJIC Nos. 8.30 [1] and 8.31. [2] He then maintains that second degree murder under CALJIC No. 8.30 requires an intent to kill whereas that crime, under CALJIC No. 8.31, requires no such intent if the act which caused death was highly dangerous to life. Defendant concludes by observing that the latter instruction impermissibly placed a lesser burden on the prosecution, obviating the intent requirement of the first instruction. (13) This court need not decide whether it was error to give both instructions in this case. Since defendant was convicted of the lesser offense of voluntary manslaughter, any possible error in the second degree murder instructions would not have influenced the outcome of the case. Thus, the (arguable) error of giving both CALJIC Nos. 8.30 and 8.31 was not prejudicial. ( People v. Watson, supra, 46 Cal.2d 818, 835.) Defendant['s] [ ] second assignment of error is highly confusing. He urges the trial court erred in instructing that the jury could find defendant guilty of such lesser included offenses of murder as voluntary manslaughter and involuntary manslaughter. At the same time, he concedes, in his brief, that voluntary manslaughter would have been an appropriate charge. (14) This court concurs in defendant's concession and notes, in light of the varying interpretations which reasonably could be given to the evidence, that instructions on murder and its included offenses were proper. (15) Defendant finally argues it was reversible error for the trial court to neglect to instruct sua sponte that witnesses Karen Harris and Ben Ward were accomplices whose testimony required corroboration. This argument must fail because, under Penal Code section 1111, an accomplice is one who is liable to prosecution for the identical offense charged against the defendant on trial in the cause in which the testimony of the accomplice is given. As no evidence was adduced at trial to show that either Karen Harris or Ben Ward joined with defendant in the killing of Bubba, neither one of them is an accomplice under Penal Code section 1111. (16) It is well established that mere presence near the scene of a crime cannot, in itself, make a person an accomplice. ( People v. Villa, 156 Cal. App.2d 128, 134 [318 P.2d 828].)