Opinion ID: 1189662
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: People v. Saille

Text: Having set forth the pertinent provisions of the 1981 statutory amendments, I next review our analysis of those provisions in Saille, where a similar issue was raised regarding the survival of the partial defense of voluntary intoxication or mental disorder. There, we held that the foregoing statutory provisions combined to bar the reduction of what would otherwise be murder to nonstatutory voluntary manslaughter due to voluntary intoxication and/or mental disorder. (54 Cal.3d at p. 1107, fn. omitted.) We found it unnecessary in Saille, however, to address the effect of these amendments upon the so-called `imperfect self-defense' doctrine [which reduces] an intentional killing from murder to manslaughter when a person kills under an honest but unreasonable belief in the necessity to defend against imminent peril to life or great bodily injury. ( Id. at p. 1107, fn. 1.) In Saille, the defendant, after drinking several beers, killed a man during a struggle. On appeal from a murder conviction, he argued, inter alia, that the trial court erred in failing to instruct the jury that voluntary intoxication could negate express malice and reduce murder to voluntary manslaughter. Although we left open the question now before us, our analysis in Saille of the effect of the 1981 amendments on the preexisting doctrine of nonstatutory voluntary manslaughter is largely dispositive of the present issue. Saille involved the continued vitality of the judicially created doctrine allowing a reduction of murder charges to voluntary manslaughter by reason of the defendant's lack of malice resulting from either voluntary intoxication or mental disorder. (See, e.g., Conley, supra, 64 Cal.2d at pp. 318-322 [one unable, because of intoxication or mental disorder, to comprehend his legal obligations to society cannot act with malice aforethought].) As we noted in Saille, 54 Cal.3d at page 1110, our Conley decision, in explaining how diminished capacity negated malice, redefined and expanded the mental component of malice aforethought beyond that stated in [former] section 188 to include a requirement that the defendant was able to comprehend the duty society places on all persons to act within the law, i.e., that he had an `awareness of the obligation to act within the general body of laws regulating society.' [Citation.] Pursuant to this definition, we concluded [in Conley ] that someone who is unable, because of intoxication or mental illness, to comprehend his duty to govern his actions in accord with the duty imposed by law, cannot act with malice aforethought. (Fn. omitted.) Saille then reviewed the 1981 statutory provisions, and particularly the amendment to Penal Code section 188 that added the following language: When it is shown that the killing resulted from the intentional doing of an act with express or implied malice as defined above, no other mental state need be shown to establish the mental state of malice aforethought. Neither an awareness of the obligation to act within the general body of laws regulating society nor acting despite such awareness is included within the definition of malice. ( Saille, supra, 54 Cal.3d at p. 1113, italics omitted.) Saille observed that The first sentence of the [foregoing] passage limits malice to the definition set forth in section 188. This sentence clearly provides that once the trier of fact finds a deliberate intention unlawfully to kill, no other mental state need be shown to establish malice aforethought. Whether a defendant acted with a wanton disregard for human life or with some antisocial motivation is no longer relevant to the issue of express malice. [Citation.] No doubt about this conclusion is possible when the last sentence of section 188 is analyzed. That sentence directly repudiates the expanded definition of malice aforethought in Conley, supra, 64 Cal.2d 310 ..., that express and implied malice include an awareness of the obligation to act within the general body of laws regulating society and the capability of acting in accordance with such awareness. After this amendment of section 188, express malice and an intent unlawfully to kill are one and the same. [Citation.] ( Saille, supra, 54 Cal.3d at pp. 1113-1114, fn. omitted.) Saille concluded that Pursuant to the language of section 188, when an intentional killing is shown, malice aforethought is established. Accordingly, the concept of `diminished capacity voluntary manslaughter' ... is no longer valid as a defense. (54 Cal.3d at p. 1114, italics added.)