Opinion ID: 1345745
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 34

Heading: Instructions/Sufficiency of Evidence.

Text: (27) Defendant contends that his convictions for attempted murder must be reversed because the court failed to instruct on the lesser included offenses of assault (§ 240) and assault by means of force likely to cause great bodily injury (§ 245), and because the evidence is insufficient to support a finding of intent to kill Sara Gawronski. The evidence was sufficient. Evidence was presented that defendant considered whether to proceed with the arson after becoming aware that he would ignite gasoline vapor in the room occupied by the infant's parents and decided to do so because he had sufficient hate and anger to go through with his plan. He knew that the child was too young to save herself from the fire he deliberately set. That evidence was sufficient to support an inference that he intended to kill the entire family. Sua sponte instructions on assault were not required. Section 1159 authorizes the trier of fact to find the defendant guilty of any offense, the commission of which is necessarily included in that with which he is charged, or of an attempt to commit the offense. An offense is necessarily included in another if (1) the greater statutory offense cannot be committed without committing the lesser because all of the elements of the lesser offense are included in the elements of the greater; or (2) if the charging allegations of the accusatory pleading include language describing it in such a way that if committed in that manner the lesser offense must necessarily be committed. ( People v. Geiger (1984) 35 Cal.3d 510, 517, fn. 4 [199 Cal. Rptr. 45, 674 P.2d 1303, 50 A.L.R.4th 1055]; People v. St. Martin (1970) 1 Cal.3d 524, 536 [83 Cal. Rptr. 166, 463 P.2d 390].) Defendant does not claim that either assault or assault by means of force likely to cause great bodily harm is an offense necessarily included with a charge of murder. He claims instead, relying on People v. Marshall (1957) 48 Cal.2d 394 [309 P.2d 456], that these offenses were included within attempted murder as charged in the information. Not so. While both attempted murder and arson were charged, the charges were made in separate counts. The allegations of the complaint did not refer in any count to assaultive conduct. No authority is offered for the proposition, implicit in defendant's claim, that arson is assaultive conduct, [37] or for his reasoning that because both arson and attempted murder were charged in the information the attempted murder charges, as pleaded, included allegations of assaultive conduct. Not only was the court under no obligation to give instructions on assault and/or assault by means of force likely to do great bodily harm, to have done so would have been error of constitutional dimension. (See People v. Geiger, supra, 35 Cal.3d 510, 526; People v. Lohbauer (1981) 29 Cal.3d 364, 368-369 [173 Cal. Rptr. 453, 627 P.2d 183].)