Opinion ID: 2640086
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Lingering Doubt Evidence

Text: Defendant contends the trial court violated his rights under the Fifth, Sixth, Eighth, and Fourteenth Amendments to the federal Constitution in not allowing consideration of any doubts that may have lingered in the minds of jurors who were not certain of his guilt beyond all doubt. (See People v. Zapien (1993) 4 Cal.4th 929, 989 [17 Cal.Rptr.2d 122, 846 P.2d 704].) As we shall explain, this claim focuses on two categories of evidence that, as he did below, defendant insists showed Sonia's manipulation and provocation of defendant: (1) Dr. Schochet's testimony describing Sonia's statements about defendant, their relationship, and her own family during therapy, and (2) a pair of letters Sonia wrote to defendant in November and December 1994, in which she expressed her love for him and her interest in resuming an intimate relationship. The trial court did not mishandle this evidence for various reasons unrelated to the concept of lingering doubt. First, as noted above, Sonia's statements to Dr. Schochet expressing feelings about defendant and other family members did not establish manipulati[ve] or provocati[ve] acts on the part of Sonia or defendant, as he claims. The court thus properly excluded this evidence as having no bearing on any mitigating inference defendant sought to raise. Second, defendant erroneously implies in his opening brief on appeal that the trial court excluded Sonia's letters to defendant. However, after noting that they were received and presumably read by defendant and were found in his possession, the trial court admitted the letters into evidence. The court reasoned that counsel, to the extent he deemed the letters relevant to the issues before the jury, could make an argument as to how [such evidence] may have affected [defendant]. No constitutional violation or other error on lingering doubt occurred.