Opinion ID: 2551468
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Failing to Excuse Jurors for Cause

Text: Next, defendant contends that his rights under the Fifth, Sixth, Eighth, and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution and article I, section 16 of the California Constitution were violated by rulings that a number of prospective jurors need not be excused for cause. In defendant's view, the prospective jurors were predisposed in favor of the death penalty without sufficient regard for the legal standards to be applied to facts that might eventually be presentedin other words, they could not be impartial as to penaltyand should have been excused for cause. Defendant concedes that he did not use all of his peremptory challenges. Accordingly, he has waived his claim that the prospective jurors should have been excused for cause. ( People v. Osband (1996) 13 Cal.4th 622, 670, 55 Cal.Rptr.2d 26, 919 P.2d 640; see also United States v. Martinez-Salazar (2000) 528 U.S. 304, 313-314, 120 S.Ct. 774, 780-781, 145 L.Ed.2d 792, 801-802.) He now claims perfunctorily that he was dissatisfied with the jury, but this belated recitation ( People v. Johnson (1992) 3 Cal.4th 1183, 1211, 14 Cal.Rptr.2d 702, 842 P.2d 1), though understandable given his death sentence, is insufficient (ibid.). To preserve a claim of trial court error in failing to remove a juror for bias in favor of the death penalty, a defendant must either exhaust all peremptory challenges and express dissatisfaction with the jury ultimately selected or justify the failure to do so. ( People v. Williams (1997) 16 Cal.4th 635, 667, 66 Cal.Rptr.2d 573, 941 P.2d 752.) Defendant did not fulfill these requirements. Rather, he told the trial court that he was satisfied with the jury as constituted, even though it included a juror whom he had previously challenged for cause. Defendant also urges that he has justified his failure to express dissatisfaction with the jury as constituted because the trial court used the struck jury selection system rather than the jury box method. He asserts that he challenged approximately 30 jurors for cause because of their attitude toward either the death penalty or him, that most of those challenges were rejected, that the number of peremptory challenges remaining when he indicated satisfaction with the jury was insufficient to purge the prospective jurors he had challenged for cause, and therefore exhausting his remaining eleven peremptories would result in an equally, if not more, unfavorable jury. But we have previously rejected the argument that the struck jury system permits exceptions to the exhaustion rule ( People v. Johnson, supra, 3 Cal.4th 1183, 1211, 14 Cal.Rptr.2d 702, 842 P.2d 1), and we decline to reexamine our reasoning (accord, People v. Osband, supra, 13 Cal.4th 622, 670, 55 Cal.Rptr.2d 26, 919 P.2d 640). Even if defendant had not explicitly said that he was satisfied with the jury, we would not be persuaded by his argument. As we stated in Johnson: `Regardless of the system of jury selection, a party's failure to exercise available peremptory challenges indicates relative satisfaction with the unchallenged jurors. Having so indicated in this case, defendant cannot reasonably claim error.' (Johnson, at pp. 1211-1212, 14 Cal.Rptr.2d 702, 842 P.2d 1.) In any event, the jury's composition did not prejudice defendant in any way. The parties agree that only one seated juror, James C, was the subject of a challenge for cause by defendant. Our review of James C.'s Hovey voir dire testimony satisfies us that the trial court properly denied the challenge. James C. initially testified that he favored imposing the death penalty in 80 percent of murder cases, though if there were mitigating circumstances, I would take them into [account] and weigh them. And he agreed that the death penalty was, in counsel's words, justified in the abstract for the killings of three people execution style. But he also testified that he would follow instructions to impose life imprisonment if he found that the mitigating and aggravating evidence was in balance, and to impose the death penalty only if he found that the aggravating evidence substantially outweighed the mitigating. He further testified that he would be receptive to mitigating evidence at the penalty phase even if defendant had been convicted of three execution-style murders. Following defendant's challenge for cause, the trial court ruled that James C.'s views on the death penalty did not substantially impair his ability to follow his oath as a juror. The ruling was proper.