Opinion ID: 1182062
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Discovery of Prosecution Records

Text: (2a) Defendant filed a motion for discovery of numerous documents alleged to be in the possession of the Fresno County District Attorney's office, including writings showing the district attorney's capital charging policies, practices, and decisions. The motion also required the accumulation and presentation of a vast amount of statistical data on cases filed and charging decisions made by the district attorney over a seven-year period, including not only complaints and informations filed and case numbers of special circumstances eligible cases but a brief summary of the facts, and race, sex and age data for each defendant and wilful homicide victim. The stated object of the motion was to obtain evidence to support a defense contention that the prosecution had in wilful homicide cases followed an enforcement policy deliberately based upon an unjustifiable standard, i.e., the race of the victim. (See Murgia v. Municipal Court (1975) 15 Cal.3d 286, 293-294 [124 Cal. Rptr. 204, 540 P.2d 44].) In support of his motion, defendant submitted a study conducted by the Fresno County Public Defender's office. The study purported to compare, by race of victim, those Fresno County cases in which defendants were sentenced to death or life in prison without possibility of parole with other Fresno County cases of wilful homicide. The study did not describe or analyze the facts or circumstances of any case, other than the sentence and the race of victim. For example, it did not attempt to distinguish between single and multiple homicide cases, nor did it attempt to account for nonracial factors that could have explained differences in charging and sentencing. The study purported to show that while only one-third of all wilful homicide victims in the county were White, all death or life-without-parole sentences were meted out in cases involving White victims. In a memorandum decision analyzing the evidence presented in support of the motion, the trial court ruled defendant had failed to make out a prima facie case sufficient to support the discovery sought. Its decision emphasized the absence of any factual comparison among the homicide cases presented by defendant, despite the availability of information in the public record that could have been used to make such a comparison. (3) Apparent disparities in sentencing are an inevitable part of our criminal justice system. ( McCleskey v. Kemp (1987) 481 U.S. 279, 312 [95 L.Ed.2d 262, 291, 107 S.Ct. 1756], fn. omitted.) [C]onstitutional guarantees are met when `the mode [for determining guilt or punishment] itself has been surrounded with safeguards to make it as fair as possible.' [Citation.] Where the discretion that is fundamental to our criminal process is involved, we decline to assume that what is unexplained is invidious. ( Id. at p. 313 [95 L.Ed.2d at p. 292].) In McCleskey, the Supreme Court held that an extensive study of 2,000 Georgia murder cases showing an apparent discrepancy in capital sentencing based on race of victim did not demonstrate a constitutionally significant risk of racial bias affecting the Georgia capital sentencing process. ( Ibid. ) Many circumstances may affect the litigation of a case chargeable under the death penalty law. These include factual nuances, strength of evidence, and, in particular, the broad discretion to show leniency. Hence, one sentenced to death under a properly channeled death penalty scheme cannot prove a constitutional violation by showing that other persons whose crimes were superficially similar did not receive the death penalty. ( People v. Keenan (1988) 46 Cal.3d 478, 506 [758 P.2d 1081].) (2b) Although a defendant seeking discovery is not required to meet the standard of proof requisite to the dismissal of a discriminatory prosecution ( People v. Municipal Court ( Street ) (1979) 89 Cal. App.3d 739, 748 [153 Cal. Rptr. 69]), discovery is not a fishing expedition. A motion for discovery must `describe the requested information with at least some degree of specificity and ... be sustained by plausible justification.' ( Griffin v. Municipal Court (1977) 20 Cal.3d 300, 306 [142 Cal. Rptr. 286, 571 P.2d 997].) No plausible justification was offered by the defense in this case. Defendant showed no more than the barest form of apparent disparity. His presentation ignored readily available, case-specific data that could, if favorable, have supplied a plausible justification for further inquiry. We are directed to no authority that requires the kind of wide-ranging foray sought by defendant based on such a meager showing. No right of defendant, constitutional or otherwise, was infringed by the denial of his discovery motion.