Opinion ID: 1399120
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Jury's Consideration of Unadjudicated Crimes Evidence

Text: Defendant contends that the way in which the jury considered evidence of previously unadjudicated crimes he allegedly committed violated his rights under the Fifth, Sixth, Eighth, and Fourteenth Amendments to the federal Constitution. Specifically, he asserts that: (1) the jury should have been required to unanimously find each of the allegations of criminal activity true beyond a reasonable doubt before considering them in aggravation; and (2) the trial court erred in admitting evidence of the unadjudicated crimes without first finding beyond a reasonable doubt that defendant committed those crimes.
(32) Defense counsel argued that the jury should be instructed to deliberate and make findings as to each of the five unadjudicated crimes in evidence. The trial court disagreed, instructing that the determination whether to consider unadjudicated criminal activity as an aggravating circumstance is made individually by each juror. Defendant contends the court erred. We have rejected defendant's argument in the past, and he does not persuade us to depart from our prior decisions. Although defendant is entitled to a unanimous jury verdict in the final determination of penalty, the law does not require a unanimous finding as to any unadjudicated crime offered in aggravation. ( People v. Miranda (1987) 44 Cal.3d 57, 99 [241 Cal. Rptr. 594, 744 P.2d 1127].) The trial court correctly instructed that each juror must make an individual determination whether the prosecution proved other criminal activity beyond a reasonable doubt before considering that activity in aggravation. ( Ibid.; see People v. Robertson (1982) 33 Cal.3d 21, 53 [188 Cal. Rptr. 77, 655 P.2d 279].) Contrary to defendant's argument, neither the instruction nor the prosecutor's argument that it was unnecessary for the jurors to take a vote on each unadjudicated crime discouraged deliberation. Defendant argues that the jurors' tasks were complicated and difficult. Indeed, they were, as the deliberative processes in penalty trials not uncommonly are. But the jurors received the instructions necessary to ensure the reliability of their determination. Defendant contends he is denied meaningful appellate review of his sentence because we cannot know how the jury viewed the evidence. His argument proves too much; reviewing courts can never probe jurors' deliberations, but this inescapable fact does not vitiate the appellate process. (33) For the first time in his reply brief, defendant makes the argument that the refusal to require specific written findings on unadjudicated offenses in the penalty phase violated his right to equal protection of the laws. A defendant subject to the imposition of a sentence enhancement under section 12022.5 is entitled to such a finding, he argues, while a capital defendant against whom unadjudicated offenses are alleged is not. He fails to recognize that the capital defendant and the defendant subject to the section 12022.5 enhancement are not similarly situated. The latter receives enhanced punishment for his use of a firearm in the commission of a crime; the former receives punishment not for the unadjudicated crimes but for the murder with special circumstances of which he has been found guilty.
(34) Defendant contends the trial court erred in admitting evidence of the Church and Dowdy killings to show prior violent criminal activity. (§ 190.3, factor (b).) His involvement in the killings was shown by circumstantial evidence and by his own admissions to Brian Buckley and Tony Maestas. He urges that the evidence should have been excluded because the prosecution did not first prove beyond a reasonable doubt that defendant committed each crime. We disagree. In People v. Phillips, supra, 41 Cal.3d 29, we observed that when the prosecution seeks to introduce evidence of other criminal activity in the penalty phase of trial, it may be advisable for the trial court to conduct a preliminary inquiry (out of the presence of the jury) to determine whether there is substantial evidence to prove each element of the other criminal activity. ( Id. at p. 72, fn. 25.) Such a procedure is strictly a matter of trial court discretion. The trial court in this case, in its discretion, conducted such a hearing, at which the corpus delicti of each killing was amply established. As to the murder of David Church, evidence adduced at the Phillips hearing  which was largely similar to that later introduced before the jury  showed that during the early part of the summer of 1986, while defendant was staying at Brian Buckley's apartment, Buckley gave a party attended by defendant, Chris Caldwell, and others. Church was among a group of people who arrived at the party about 10 p.m. and stayed for 10 to 20 minutes. A half hour later, Church returned alone. Because he was drunk, Buckley did not want him around. Defendant, Buckley, and Caldwell took Church downstairs. At Caldwell's direction, Buckley then returned to the party. Fifteen minutes later, defendant and Caldwell reentered Buckley's apartment. Defendant said he had scared Church and slashed his bicycle tires with a knife. Caldwell took an ax handle and the keys to Buckley's mother's car and, with defendant, went downstairs. Buckley saw Church sitting at the bottom of the stairs. After midnight, he did not see Church again. The next morning, Buckley saw a 10-speed bicycle with slashed tires at the apartment. Defendant and Caldwell said they were going to get rid of the bicycle because defendant's knife could be traced from the slashes. By the third day after the party, the bicycle was gone. Three days after the party, defendant told Buckley that he and Caldwell had killed Church. Caldwell had already told Buckley that. A couple of days later, defendant, Caldwell, and Buckley had another conversation about the Church killing. Defendant said he hit Church across the head with the ax handle, that Church was pretty tough. Caldwell told Buckley how hard Church was to kill. A week later, defendant and Buckley were standing outside Buckley's apartment. Defendant was holding the ax handle, stating that he had to throw it away because there was blood on it. Fred Helmuth, a friend of David Church, testified that after the evening of the visit to Buckley's apartment, he never saw Church again. Dr. Frederick Lovell testified that he examined human remains found under a mound of rocks in a riverbed in Aliso Canyon near Santa Paula on July 29, 1986. The body was decomposed, the little remaining skin being mummified. Dr. Lovell estimated that the deceased had been dead more than six weeks, to an upper limit of six to ten months. After performing an autopsy, Dr. Lovell was unable to determine the cause of death. A comparison study of X-rays established that the dead man was David Church. Clearly, the proof adduced at the Phillips hearing ( supra, 41 Cal.3d 29), apart from defendant's extrajudicial statements to Brian Buckley, created a reasonable inference that David Church died by criminal agency, and thus sufficed to permit the admission into evidence of those statements. ( People v. Towler (1982) 31 Cal.3d 105, 115 [181 Cal. Rptr. 391, 641 P.2d 1253].) Just as clearly, the weight of the proof, including the statements, must be described as substantial. The trial court correctly allowed the evidence to go to the jury. As to the killing of Jack Dowdy, Jr., the proof adduced at the Phillips hearing likewise sufficed to permit the introduction of defendant's extrajudicial admissions and to warrant presentation of the evidence to the jury. Dowdy's father testified that he never saw his son after the latter left for Albuquerque, where he was to attend a union-sponsored trade school. Kim Dowdy, whose marriage to Jack Dowdy had not been dissolved, testified about defendant's violently possessive behavior toward her. Jane Davis, Dowdy's sister, testified that after a family gathering she saw defendant make a motion toward Dowdy with his hand inside his pocket, where Ms. Davis knew defendant kept a gun. Pam Lester, Dowdy's girlfriend, overheard the victim and defendant talking about Kim Dowdy shortly before Dowdy's disappearance. Dowdy was supposed to call Lester after the first day of his trade school, but did not. Jackie Sumner, the cousin with whom Dowdy was staying while attending school, last saw him early on the morning of the first day of his classes; he never returned to her home to pick up his clothes. The trade school records showed that Dowdy attended his first scheduled day of a week of classes, but did not return thereafter. He would have received $447.42 for completing his classes. Based on this evidence, the trial court did not err in admitting defendant's statements to Brian Buckley about his role in Dowdy's killing. That Dowdy was murdered was a reasonable inference from the evidence that he left his property behind and disappeared, without completing trade school and without ever contacting his girlfriend or the relatives with whom he enjoyed a close relationship. (See People v. Johnson (1991) 233 Cal. App.3d 425, 439-442 [284 Cal. Rptr. 579] [to establish corpus delicti, evidence need not negate all possibilities of the victim's death by noncriminal agency or of the victim's continued existence].) The court also correctly concluded that the evidence of defendant's guilt, including his admissions to Buckley, his relationship with Kim Dowdy and his apparent assault on Jack Dowdy, was substantial enough to go to the jury. [18]