Opinion ID: 2600675
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 6

Heading: Asserted unconstitutional vagueness of section 190.3, factor (a)

Text: Defendant also asserts that section 190.3, factor (a), which permits the jury to consider the circumstances of the crime as a possible aggravating factor, is so broad and ill defined that it encourages jurors to impose the death penalty arbitrarily and capriciously. Defendant provides examples from California decisions demonstrating that prosecutors have relied upon a wide range of facts in arguing that the circumstances of the crime should be treated as an aggravating factor. As we previously have noted, judicial decisions have rejected these vagueness and overbreadth arguments. (See Tuilaepa v. California (1994) 512 U.S. 967, 975-976 [129 L.Ed.2d 750, 114 S.Ct. 2630] ( Tuilaepa) ; People v. Cook, supra, 40 Cal.4th at p. 1366; Panah, supra, 35 Cal.4th at p. 499; People v. Carpenter (1999) 21 Cal.4th 1016, 1064 [90 Cal.Rptr.2d 607, 988 P.2d 531].) As the high court stated in Tuilaepa, [t]he circumstances of the crime are a traditional subject for consideration by the sentencer, and an instruction to consider the circumstances is neither vague nor otherwise improper under our Eighth Amendment jurisprudence. ( Tuilaepa, supra, 512 U.S. at p. 976; People v. Cook, supra, 40 Cal.4th at p. 1366.)