Opinion ID: 2545831
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 10

Heading: Instruction on unadjudicated crimes

Text: Citing the wording of the instruction quoted in footnote 4, ante, defendant claims a deprivation of rights guaranteed under the federal Constitution's Fifth, Sixth, and Fourteenth Amendments, thus requiring reversal of the death judgment. Specifically, defendant points to the instruction's listing of the unadjudicated criminal activity (the attempted murders of Smith and Redenius, the murder of defendant's mother, and the possession of a shank in county jail and of a sawed-off shotgun) followed by the phrase which involved the express or implied use of force or violence or the threat of force or violence. This formulation, according to defendant, told the jury that each listed instance of unadjudicated criminal activity actually involved force or violence, and thus directed [a] verdict on an essential element of the factor (b) finding. Defendant concedes that two of the incidents, the murder of defendant's mother and the attempted murder of Redenius, if accepted by the jury, clearly involved force or violence. But he disputes that his actions toward Smith had crossed the line into attempted murder, and that his possession of a shank in jail or his earlier possession of a sawed-off shotgun in his home at age 18 involved express or implied use of force or violence or the threat to use force or violence. We discern no instructional error. CALJIC No. 8.87, as given by the trial court, instructed the jury that Evidence has been introduced for the purpose of showing that defendant had committed the specified unadjudicated criminal acts involving force or violence. It further said that [b]efore a juror may consider any of such criminal acts or activity as an aggravating circumstance, a juror must be satisfied beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant did in fact commit such criminal acts or activity. In addition, the trial court instructed the jury as follows: You must not consider as an aggravating circumstance any evidence or alleged criminal activity by the defendant which did not involve the use or attempted use of force or violence or which did not involve the use of threat or implied [sic] to use violence. These instructions, considered together, properly told the jurors that they could consider any of the specified unadjudicated criminal acts as factors in aggravation only if they found beyond a reasonable doubt that defendant had committed the act or activity, and that it involved the use or attempted use or express or implied threat to use force or violence.