Opinion ID: 2600070
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Use of competency hearing evidence at the guilt phase

Text: Before trial, defense counsel moved in limine for an order precluding the prosecutor from presenting at the guilt or penalty phase any evidence that had been developed for the section 1368 competency hearing. In particular, defense counsel sought to prevent the prosecutor from using as evidence in aggravation defendant's records from Harbor View Hospital, the inpatient drug rehabilitation facility where defendant had received treatment at age 16. The prosecutor had subpoenaed the Harbor View records after reading, in the report of a defense-retained competency expert, that defendant had been hospitalized there. The trial court conducted two hearings on the motion. At the first, the trial court observed and the parties agreed that under People v. Arcega (1982) 32 Cal.3d 504 [186 Cal.Rptr. 94, 651 P.2d 338] ( Arcega ), defendant's statements to the court-appointed psychiatrists, Drs. Cerbone, Haroun, and Michel, and the fruits of any such statements, were inadmissible in the prosecutor's case-in-chief. However, at the second hearing, the trial court ruled that if during the guilt phase the defense called any expert who had testified at the competency hearing, then the prosecutor could use the witness's prior testimony for impeachment. The defense called Dr. Cerbone as an expert witness at the guilt phase, and he testified that defendant suffered from substance-induced psychotic disorders, psychotic disorders not otherwise specified, and various forms of substance dependence. Dr. Cerbone arrived at those diagnoses after interviewing defendant and reviewing numerous materials, including police and investigative reports, psychiatric evaluations by four other mental health experts, hospital records, and summaries of interviews with friends, family, and members of defendant's household during his adolescence and young adulthood. Defense counsel handed Dr. Cerbone the Harbor View records for reference, and he used them extensively during his testimony. For instance, Dr. Cerbone testified he had learned from the records that defendant began using methamphetamine when he was between 12 and 14 years old, that the facility's treating psychiatrist had prescribed antipsychotic drugs, and that during defendant's hospitalizations, he periodically exhibited lack of impulse control, excessive responses to provocation, and paranoid behavior. Dr. Cerbone also testified that while defendant was at Harbor View, he was sometimes so imposing and threatening that he had to be physically restrained and sedated. On cross-examination, the prosecutor's questioning drew from both the Harbor View records and the reports of the other mental experts who had evaluated defendant for competency, including Dr. Cerbone himself. For example, over defense objection, the prosecutor asked Dr. Cerbone why his present diagnosis differed from the one he had offered at the competency hearing, which was antisocial personality disorder. Quoting from the reports of Harbor View's treating psychiatrist, court-appointed competency expert Dr. Michel, and the defense-retained competency expert, Dr. MacSpeiden, the prosecutor asked Dr. Cerbone why no other expert had diagnosed defendant as psychotic. Finally, again over defense objection, the prosecutor asked Dr. Cerbone about two incidents, described in the Harbor View records, in which defendant had threatened staff. The prosecutor read from the records that defendant once told a staff member, I will kill you, rip off your head, and stuff it down your neck, and that on another occasion defendant called a staff member a bitch, cunt, whore. Dr. Cerbone responded that defendant was withdrawing from drugs at the time, which likely manifested itself in impulsive, threatening behavior. On redirect examination, Dr. Cerbone described the new evidence and information that supported his current diagnosis, including psychiatric records from the Veterans Administration showing that defendant's father was paranoid schizophrenic. He again referred to the reports and testimony from the competency hearing when he explained why he disagreed with the diagnoses of the other experts who evaluated defendant for competency. Defendant claims the trial court erred in permitting the prosecutor to cross-examine Dr. Cerbone with evidence obtained in preparation for and derived from the competency proceeding. Defendant complains specifically about the prosecutor's questions disclosing the diagnoses of the other competency experts and defendant's threats of violence against Harbor View staff. (11) When a doubt arises as to a defendant's competency to stand trial, the trial court must suspend proceedings and appoint a psychiatrist or psychologist to evaluate the defendant. (§§ 1368, 1369.) Where, as occurred here, the defendant is not seeking a finding of mental incompetence, the trial court must appoint two such evaluators, one of whom may be named by the defense and one by the prosecution. (§ 1369, subd. (a).) A court-compelled competency examination implicates a defendant's Fifth Amendment rights. ( People v. Pokovich (2006) 39 Cal.4th 1240, 1253 [48 Cal.Rptr.3d 158, 141 P.3d 267] ( Pokovich ); Estelle v. Smith (1981) 451 U.S. 454, 468-469 [68 L.Ed.2d 359, 101 S.Ct. 1866] ( Smith ).) Nonetheless, a defendant must submit to a competency examination by the court-appointed experts and may not refuse to do so by invoking his right against selfincrimination. ( Tarantino v. Superior Court (1975) 48 Cal.App.3d 465, 470 [122 Cal.Rptr. 61].) This requirement does not violate a defendant's selfincrimination rights because we have established a rule of immunity providing that  `neither the statements of [the defendant] to the psychiatrists appointed under section 1369 nor the fruits of such statements may be used in trial of the issue of [the defendant's] guilt....' ( Arcega, supra, 32 Cal.3d at p. 522, quoting Tarantino v. Superior Court, supra, at p. 470.) By ensuring that a defendant will not be convicted by statements he made in the course of a court-compelled competency evaluation, this rule promotes accuracy in the psychiatric evaluation and protects both an accused's privilege against self-incrimination and the public policy of not trying persons who are mentally incompetent. ( Arcega, supra, at p. 522.) No decision by the United States Supreme Court addresses how Fifth Amendment principles apply to the specific circumstances presented here. But, taken together, the high court's decisions in Smith, supra, 451 U.S. 454, Buchanan v. Kentucky (1987) 483 U.S. 402 [97 L.Ed.2d 336, 107 S.Ct. 2906] ( Buchanan ), and Powell v. Texas (1989) 492 U.S. 680 [106 L.Ed.2d 551, 109 S.Ct. 3146] ( Powell ) support the conclusion that the prosecutor's impeachment of the defense expert in this case did not violate defendant's self-incrimination rights. (12) Smith, supra, 451 U.S. at page 468, holds that when a court compels a defendant to submit to a competency examination and the defendant does not place his mental state in issue at the guilt or penalty phase, the prosecution may not call the court-appointed psychiatrist to testify in its case in aggravation regarding the defendant's future dangerousness. The Smith court acknowledged the appellate decisions holding that the prosecution may obtain and use evidence from a compelled sanity examination when a defendant asserts an insanity defense and introduces psychiatric testimony. But it found those cases inapposite because, in Smith, the defendant had not put his competency or sanity in issue. ( Id. at p. 465.) In Buchanan, supra, 483 U.S. at pages 421-424, the defendant requested a psychiatric examination and raised a mental status defense at trial. Under these circumstances, the high court held, the Fifth Amendment does not preclude the prosecution from using the examination for rebuttal to the defense testimony. Buchanan reasoned that Smith 's holding logically leads to the proposition that if a defendant requests [a psychiatric] evaluation or presents psychiatric evidence, then, at the very least, the prosecution may rebut this presentation with evidence from the reports of the examination that the defendant requested. ( Buchanan, supra, at pp. 422-423.) A contrary conclusion, the high court explained, would mean that the prosecution could not respond to the defendant's mental status defense, which he based on psychological reports. ( Id. at p. 423.) In Powell, supra, 492 U.S. 680, the high court again addressed the Fifth Amendment implications of the prosecution's use of a court-compelled psychiatric evaluation at the penalty phase. In so doing, it appeared to approve the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals decision in Battie v. Estelle (5th Cir. 1981) 655 F.2d 692. Powell explained that in Battie, the Court of Appeals suggested that if a defendant introduces psychiatric testimony to establish a mental-status defense, the government may be justified in also using such testimony to rebut the defense notwithstanding the defendant's assertion that the psychiatric examination was conducted in violation of his right against self-incrimination. ( Powell, supra, at pp. 683-684.) Powell found that Smith and Buchanan provided some support for Battie. ( Powell, supra, at p. 684.) Here, defendant presented Dr. Cerbone's testimony in support of a mental status defense at the guilt phase. Under these circumstances, the Fifth Amendment did not preclude the prosecution from impeaching him with the evidence on which he based his opinion, which included the Harbor View Hospital records and the reports of the court-appointed competency experts. The North Carolina Supreme Court reached a similar conclusion in State v. Davis (1998) 349 N.C. 1 [506 S.E.2d 455]. In that case, the trial court appointed Dr. Wolfe to evaluate the defendant for competency, and she tested the defendant while he was confined at Dorothea Dix Hospital. The defendant was eventually found competent. During trial, the defendant presented evidence in support of insanity and diminished capacity. The defense expert, Dr. McKee, testified that he had reviewed the records of the defendant's competency evaluation at Dorothea Dix, and during cross-examination, the prosecutor referred to those records. ( Id., 506 S.E.2d at pp. 463, 466-467.) On appeal, the defendant claimed the prosecutor's cross-examination violated his rights under the Fifth Amendment. The North Carolina Supreme Court disagreed. Relying on Smith and Buchanan, it concluded that because the defense expert had reviewed and referred to the defendant's competency evaluation records, the prosecution was not foreclosed from relying on the same materials to rebut the defendant's contentions. ( Davis, at pp. 477-478.) (13) For two reasons, we reject defendant's argument that notwithstanding Smith and its progeny, the prosecutor's cross-examination was improper under California law. First, the rule of immunity we established for statements made to a court-appointed competency evaluator is founded on Fifth Amendment principles. ( Pokovich, supra, 39 Cal.4th at p. 1253, fn. 5; Arcega, supra, 32 Cal.3d at pp. 522-523; see also People v. Jablonski (2006) 37 Cal.4th 774, 802-803 [38 Cal.Rptr.3d 98, 126 P.3d 938] [California's judicially declared immunity is coextensive with the 5th Amend.].) Second, none of our decisions supports defendant's argument. For instance, in Pokovich, supra, 39 Cal.4th at page 1254, we found that the trial court had erred in allowing the prosecutor to impeach the defendant's testimony at trial with statements he made during his mental competency evaluation. However, the defendant in that case, although testifying on his own behalf, did not present a mental status defense. Here, by contrast, defendant placed his mental state in issue and presented psychiatric evidence based largely on material from the competency examination. As previously explained, these circumstances warrant a different result. [10]