Opinion ID: 1190325
Heading Depth: 5
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: Instructions and Argument on Mitigating Evidence Section 190.3, Factor (k)

Text: (10a) Defendant contends that the trial court's instructions and the prosecutor's argument led the jurors to believe, incorrectly, that they were not permitted to consider defendant's mitigating evidence. Our review of the record does not support the contention. As already mentioned, defendant's case in mitigation consisted of evidence to the effect that he had experienced a religious conversion in prison and had subsequently behaved well. To present this case defendant called eight witnesses, including his pastor, a deputy sheriff who testified that defendant had a calming effect on other prisoners, four inmates who testified to defendant's sincerity, including one who testified that defendant had persuaded him not to commit suicide, defendant's mother, and the director of a religious organization that ministered to prisoners. At the close of the penalty phase the trial court instructed the jury in the language of section 190.3, factor (k) (hereafter, factor (k)). Thus, the jurors heard that they were to consider [a]ny other circumstance which extenuates the gravity of the crime even though it is not a legal excuse for the crime. The trial court denied defense counsel's request to modify the instruction to refer specifically to evidence of the defendant's character, background, history, mental condition and physical condition. Although the court agreed with counsel that factor (k) was a catch-all provision and permitted the jury to consider such evidence, the court expressed reluctan[ce] to change a CALJIC instruction that followed the statute verbatim. During closing argument, the prosecutor incorrectly argued that factor (k) referred to some factor at the time of the offense that somehow operates to reduce the gravity for what the defendant did but not to anything after the fact or later. On appeal, defendant contends that the jurors probably accepted the prosecutor's interpretation of factor (k) and, thus, disregarded the extensive testimony about defendant's religious conversion. In essence, defendant asserts the type of claim that we addressed in People v. Easley (1983) 34 Cal.3d 858 [196 Cal. Rptr. 309, 671 P.2d 813]. In that case, which we decided two years after defendant's trial, we recommended that courts in the future adorn factor (k) with the explanatory gloss that juries are permitted to consider any other `aspect of defendant's character or record ... that the defendant proffers as a basis for a sentence less than death.' ( Easley, supra, 34 Cal.3d at p. 878, fn. 10.) Our recommendation was motivated by the argument that a jury instruction in the language of factor (k) would violate the federal Eighth Amendment if understood by the jury as barring consideration of character and background evidence. The Eighth Amendment, of course, requires that the sentencer be permitted to consider such evidence. ( Eddings v. Oklahoma (1982) 455 U.S. 104, 110-112 [71 L.Ed.2d 1, 102 S.Ct. 869]; Lockett v. Ohio (1978) 438 U.S. 586, 602-609 [57 L.Ed.2d 973, 988-993, 98 S.Ct. 2954]; see also Skipper v. South Carolina (1986) 476 U.S. 1, 4-9 [90 L.Ed.2d 1, 6-9, 106 S.Ct. 1669] [regarding good behavior in prison].) (11) Since our decision in Easley, however, the United States Supreme Court has held that the language of factor (k) satisfies the federal Eighth Amendment. ( Boyde v. California (1990) 494 U.S. 370, 372, 377-386 [108 L.Ed.2d 316, 324, 326-333, 110 S.Ct. 1190] ( Boyde ).) The court reasoned that factor (k) does not, as the petitioner in that case argued, limit the jury's consideration to `any other circumstance of the crime which extenuates the gravity of the crime.' ( Boyde, supra, 494 U.S. at p. 382 [108 L.Ed.2d at p. 330], italics in original.) Instead, the factor directs the jury to consider any other circumstance that might excuse the crime, which certainly includes a defendant's background and character. ( Ibid., italics in original.) The high court found its conclusion to be reinforced by the other sentencing factors, which allow for consideration of mitigating evidence not associated with the crime itself, such as the absence of prior criminal activity by a defendant, the absence of prior felony convictions, and youth. When factor (k) is viewed together with those instructions, it seems even more improbable that jurors would arrive at an interpretation that precludes consideration of all non-crime-related evidence. ( Id., at p. 383.) To be sure, the high court's holding in Boyde does not prevent a defendant from asserting a claim to the effect that prosecutorial argument, or other factors, led the jury to misinterpret factor (k). ( Boyde, supra, 494 U.S. at p. 384 [108 L.Ed.22d at pp. 331-332].) However, in evaluating such claims we do not treat comments by attorneys as if they had the same force as the trial court's instructions on the law. This is because [t]he former are usually billed in advance to the jury as matters of argument, not evidence, and are likely viewed as the statements of advocates; the latter ... are viewed as definitive and binding statements of the law. ( Ibid. ) Rather than creating a rule to the effect that incorrect remarks by attorneys about the permissible scope of mitigating evidence are presumed to have misled the jury, Boyde teaches that there is constitutional error only if it is reasonably likely that such remarks led the jurors to understand the trial court's instructions as precluding consideration of relevant mitigating evidence offered by the defendant. ( Boyde, supra, 494 U.S. at pp. 378-381, 386 [108 L.Ed.2d at pp. 327-330, 332-333].) Boyde also teaches that comments by attorneys must be judged in the context in which they are made. ( Id., at p. 385 [108 L.Ed.2d at p. 332].) To the same effect, we have said that we will examine pre- Easley cases on [their] own merits to determine whether, in context, the sentencer may have been misled to defendant's prejudice about the scope of its sentencing discretion.... ( People v. Brown (1985) 40 Cal.3d 512, 544, fn. 17 [220 Cal. Rptr. 637, 709 P.2d 440].) With regard to the standard of review in cases such as this, Brown, supra, 40 Cal.3d 512, and Easley, supra, 34 Cal.3d 858, should not be understood as requiring more or less than Boyde, supra, 494 U.S. 370. (10b) Applying this analysis to the case before us, we do not consider it reasonably likely that the jurors believed the law required them to disregard defendant's mitigating evidence. Several considerations lead us to this conclusion. It is true that the prosecutor during closing argument suggested a narrow and incorrect interpretation of factor (k). The factor, he told the jury, says any other circumstance which extenuates or lessens the gravity of the crime. What does that mean? That to me means some ... factor at the time of the offense that somehow operates to reduce the gravity for what the defendant did. [¶] It doesn't refer to anything after the fact or later. That's particularly important here because the only defense evidence you have heard has been about this new born Christianity. Any impact this argument may have had, however, was immediately blunted by defense counsel's objection, which led the court to remind the jury that lawyers' comments were not evidence but argument, and to be placed in [their] proper perspective. (Cf. Boyde, supra, 494 U.S. at p. 384 [108 L.Ed.2d at pp. 331-332] [recognizing that such comments are likely viewed as the statements of advocates, especially when billed in advance to the jury as matters of argument, not evidence].) Later in his closing argument, the prosecutor implicitly conceded the relevance of defendant's mitigating evidence by devoting substantial attention to it. The prosecutor also suggested, properly, how the jury might weigh defendant's evidence against the evidence in aggravation. To quote: The law in its simplicity is that ... if the aggravating factors outweigh the mitigating, the sentence the jury should vote for should be the death penalty. [¶] How do the factors line up? The circumstances and facts of the case, the defendant's other acts showing violence, Mrs. Pensinger and Mrs. Stone, ... Blaine Pensinger, the defendant's two prior convictions line up against really nothing except defendant's newborn Christianity and the fact that he's 28 years old. This is not close. Obviously, this exercise by the prosecutor had a point only if it was contemplated that the jury would consider defendant's evidence. (Cf. People v. Mason (1991) 52 Cal.3d 909, 965 [277 Cal. Rptr. 166, 802 P.2d 950], and People v. Guzman (1988) 45 Cal.3d 915, 957 [248 Cal. Rptr. 467, 755 P.2d 917] [in which the attention paid by prosecutors in closing argument to defense evidence was found to have undercut suggestions that such evidence was not mitigating under factor (k)].) For the jury to have accepted a narrow view of factor (k) in this case would have meant disregarding all of defendant's mitigating evidence, since the testimony of his eight penalty phase witnesses was all directed to his religious conversion and consequent behavior in prison. Indeed, it would have meant disregarding virtually the entire penalty phase, since the testimony of the prosecution's two witnesses occupies only eleven pages of the transcript. We think it unlikely, however, as did the high court in Boyde, that reasonable jurors would believe the court's instructions transformed all of [defendant's] `favorable testimony into a virtual charade.' ( Boyde, supra, 494 U.S. at p. 383 [108 L.Ed.2d at p. 331].) The high court's observation is especially apt when the trial court, as here, has also instructed the jury to consider all of the evidence which has been received during any part of the trial in determining the penalty. (See ibid. ) Defense counsel, in his own closing argument, strongly reinforced the correct view that defendant's religious conversion was proper mitigating evidence. (Cf. People v. Guzman, supra, 45 Cal.3d at p. 957 [holding that a prosecutor's comments about factor (k) were cured by defense counsel's comments].) Responding to the prosecutor's earlier argument that factor (k) permitted the jury to consider crime-related evidence only, defense counsel presented the following, proper interpretation of the law: section (k) may be awkwardly worded, but it does not preclude or exclude the kind of evidence that was presented. It's a catch-all phrase. It was designed to include, not exclude, that kind of evidence. [¶] Any jury ... that was in the position of trying to determine the fairest possible sentences, select them between death or life without possibility of parole, would not only want that kind of evidence but would need it to make an intelligent decision. The court did not permit the prosecutor to argue in rebuttal. On this record, it is not reasonably likely that the jury understood the court's instructions as precluding consideration of defendant's mitigating evidence. While the court did not embellish the language of factor (k), that fact standing alone does not support a claim of error. (See Boyde, supra, 494 U.S. at p. 381 [108 L.Ed.2d at pp. 329-330]; People v. Mason, supra, 52 Cal.3d at p. 965.) Moreover, while the prosecutor's interpretation of factor (k) was clearly incorrect, any force it might have had was blunted by the court's instruction to consider all of the evidence, the prosecutor's own discussion of defendant's mitigating evidence, and defense counsel's correct statement of the law. Accordingly, we find no instructional error. (12) Defendant has asked us to judicially notice the transcript of oral argument before the United States Supreme Court in Boyde, supra, 494 U.S. 370, in which, in response to questioning, the Attorney General said that the prosecutor in this case misled the jurors. The dissent relies substantially on this concession, and appears to argue that we should judicially notice the transcript. We disagree. We have examined the transcript of the oral argument in Boyde, and find nothing in it relevant to the proper resolution of this case. Even if a matter is a proper subject of judicial notice, it must still be relevant. (Evid. Code, § 350; Mozzetti v. City of Brisbane (1977) 67 Cal. App.3d 565, 578 [136 Cal. Rptr. 751].) The meaning of the high court's opinion in Boyde, supra, 494 U.S. 370, must be gleaned from the opinion itself. Moreover, whatever critical remarks might have been made during oral argument in Boyde about the prosecutor's argument in the case before us were made without the benefit of a full examination of the record  an examination that the opinion in Boyde requires us to undertake before concluding that constitutional error has occurred. ( Boyde, supra, 494 U.S. at p. 385 [108 L.Ed.2d at p. 332].) Contrary to the implication of the dissent, we are not ignoring the officially expressed views of the Attorney General. In this case, he is arguing vigorously, based upon the entire record, that the jury was not misled. It is our duty to decide the issue based on the arguments and record of this case, not comments taken out of context in a different case. (See People v. Pinholster (1992) 1 Cal.4th 865, 974-975 [4 Cal. Rptr.2d 765, 824 P.2d 571] [pretrial evaluation of a case by a supervising deputy district attorney irrelevant to our assessment of the prejudicial effect of any errors at trial].) We have performed this duty. The request to take judicial notice is therefore denied.