Opinion ID: 1226896
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Denial of Motion to Strike the Testimony of the People's Witnesses

Text: At the penalty phase, the People called two witnesses in its case-in-chief, Nancy Tall and Rochelle Schreiber. Each had formerly been married to defendant. Each testified to conduct on his part that the People claimed amounted to other [violent] criminal activity within the meaning of Penal Code section 190.3 (hereafter section 190.3), viz., assault and/or battery. Specifically, Tall related a single incident: once, in the course of an argument, defendant went to strike her and she twisted away and dislocated her shoulder. Her testimony was brief, filling fewer than five pages of reporter's transcript on direct examination and fewer than two on cross-examination. Schreiber related three incidents: on one occasion, during an argument, defendant slapp[ed] me around; on another, defendant and her brother got into fist fight, which she ended by firing a gunshot into the air; later, he became mad because I fired the gun and afraid if they didn't stop fighting I would have shot him, and proceeded to kind of bop[ ] my head a couple of times. Her testimony too was brief, filling about nine pages on direct examination and about four on cross-examination. More than a week after Tall and Schreiber had been on the stand, defendant made an oral motion, outside the presence of the jury, to strike their testimony. His grounds were two in number. The first was that the evidence was inadmissible under the notice requirement of section 190.3 because the People did not give formal notice. The second was that the evidence was also inadmissible under the due process clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution and article I, sections 7 and 15, of the California Constitution, because each of those guaranties bars introduction of unadjudicated criminal activity. After a hearing, the trial court denied the motion. Defendant requested permission to file moving papers. The court refused. Defendant now contends that the trial court erred by denying his motion to strike the testimony of Tall and Schreiber. As stated above, a ruling on a motion such as the present, which concerns the admissibility of evidence, is apparently subject to review for abuse of discretion. (46) The trial court did in fact err by denying the motion insofar as it was based on the notice requirement of section 190.3. The statutory provision declares in pertinent part that no evidence may be presented by the prosecution in aggravation unless notice of the evidence to be introduced has been given to the defendant within a reasonable period of time as determined by the court, prior to trial.  (Italics added.) In People v. Daniels (1991) 52 Cal.3d 815, 879 [277 Cal. Rptr. 122, 802 P.2d 906], we construed the italicized phrase to mean before the cause is called for trial. [15] Here, the People did not give any notice before such time. Reversal, however, does not follow. Clearly, the reasonable possibility standard of People v. Brown, supra, 46 Cal.3d 432, 446-448, which applies to state-law error at the penalty phase of a capital trial ( id. at p. 448), applies here. (See People v. Taylor (1990) 52 Cal.3d 719, 737 [276 Cal. Rptr. 391, 801 P.2d 1142].) Under that test, the error is harmless. The testimony of Tall and Schreiber brought no appreciable weight to the balance of aggravation and mitigation. In his summation, the prosecutor expressly conceded that the evidence in question was [v]ery minimal. No reasonable juror could have disagreed. (47) By contrast, the trial court did not err by denying the motion insofar as it was based on the due process clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution and article I, sections 7 and 15, of the California Constitution. Contrary to defendant's assertion, neither the federal nor state guaranty bars introduction of unadjudicated criminal activity. (See People v. McDowell (1988) 46 Cal.3d 551, 569 [250 Cal. Rptr. 530, 758 P.2d 1060] [considering both the federal and state constitutional provisions], following People v. Balderas (1985) 41 Cal.3d 144, 204-205 [222 Cal. Rptr. 184, 711 P.2d 480]; see also People v. Benson, supra, 52 Cal.3d at p. 789 [considering only the federal provision].) (48) Defendant also claims that the trial court erred by denying his motion insofar as it was based on such grounds as the following: (1) the evidence was inadmissible because it did not show other [violent] criminal activity within the meaning of section 190.3; (2) the evidence was inadmissible under section 190.3 as well as the due process clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution and article I, sections 7 and 15, of the California Constitution, and the cruel and unusual punishments clauses of the Eighth Amendment and article I, section 17, because any other [violent] criminal activity it might have shown was beyond the applicable period of limitations; and (3) the evidence was inadmissible because it was substantially more prejudicial than probative under Evidence Code section 352. We reject the point on procedural grounds. As stated above, the rule is that a defendant may not complain on appeal that evidence was inadmissible on a certain ground if he did not rely on that ground in a timely and specific fashion in the trial court. At trial, defendant did not rely on a basis other than the notice requirement of section 190.3 and the bar against the introduction of unadjudicated criminal activity he claimed to discover in the due process clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment and article I, sections 7 and 15. We discern no exception to the applicability of the foregoing rule here. All the same, we note that in People v. Jennings (1988) 46 Cal.3d 963, 982 [251 Cal. Rptr. 278, 760 P.2d 475], we held that section 190.3 does not contemplate limitation of such evidence to crimes for which prosecution is not barred by the applicable statute of limitations.