Opinion ID: 2621639
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Exclusion of Testimony by Drug Addiction Expert

Text: Defendant contends that the trial court erred in precluding certain testimony by the only defense witness at the guilt phase, Dr. S. Alex Stalcup, who testified as an expert on drug addiction. Defendant claims that, by precluding Dr. Stalcup from answering two questions, the trial court not only erred under state evidence law, but also violated defendant's rights under the Fifth, Sixth, Eighth, and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution and parallel provisions of the state Constitution. Dr. Stalcup testified that defendant was a drug addict on September 4, 1989 (the date of the murders), and that the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (3d ed. rev.) recognized addiction as a mental disease or disorder. Dr. Stalcup described the diagnostic symptoms of drug addiction and explained why, in his opinion, defendant exhibited each of these symptoms. Dr. Stalcup described certain risk factors for addiction and related those factors to defendant's background. Dr. Stalcup then described the typical pattern for an addict's use of crack cocaine, in binges occurring at two-week intervals, explaining that toward the end of a binge the addict would experience a state known as tweaking, a very negative psychological state that the addict experiences as intolerable and during which the addict would do anything, anything at all in this drug-driven state to get more coke. Dr. Stalcup testified that some of defendant's behavior on September 4 and 5, 1989, was consistent with tweaking. Defendant told Dr. Stalcup that he drank a half-pint of strong alcohol (Southern Comfort) on the way to the Garcias' house, and Dr. Stalcup also considered it significant that defendant bought and used crack cocaine before obtaining medical treatment for his severely injured hands. Defense counsel then asked Dr. Stalcup this question: [H]ow does this binge cycle or pattern of use and abuse apply specifically to [defendant] in the days before the death of the Garcias and on the day of the death of the Garcias? The trial court did not permit this question, explaining that because Dr. Stalcup didn't examine or see defendant in September 1989, the witness can't give you that opinion. The court suggested that counsel ask a hypothetical question. Defense counsel then framed a hypothetical question, asking Dr. Stalcup to assume that someone was using crack cocaine, was working, making some money, immediately using more crack cocaine, and that this person goes into a home, sees some money lying around, can't remember what happened thereafter. Counsel then asked whether this described conduct was consistent with somebody in your medical opinion who was in a binge cycle? Dr. Stalcup replied, Absolutely and proceeded to explain this answer. In so restricting Dr. Stalcup's testimony, the trial court applied well-established state law principles governing expert testimony. When expert opinion is offered, much must be left to the trial court's discretion. ( People v. Carpenter (1997) 15 Cal.4th 312, 403, 63 Cal.Rptr.2d 1, 935 P.2d 708.) Although an expert may base an opinion on hearsay, the trial court may exclude from the expert's testimony any hearsay matter whose irrelevance, unreliability, or potential for prejudice outweighs its proper probative value. ( People v. Montiel (1993) 5 Cal.4th 877, 919, 21 Cal.Rptr.2d 705, 855 P.2d 1277.) Here, the trial court acted within its discretion in preventing Dr. Stalcup from expressing an opinion on whether defendant's conduct immediately before, during, and after the charged crimes was consistent with the binge pattern of crack cocaine use. That opinion would necessarily be based in large part on defendant's hearsay statements to Dr. Stalcup during an interview four years after the events in question. To avoid putting this potentially self-serving and unreliable hearsay before the jury, without defendant ever having testified and submitted to cross-examination, the trial court could properly require the defense to proceed by the use of hypothetical questions. ( People v. Price, supra, 1 Cal.4th at p. 416, 3 Cal.Rptr.2d 106, 821 P.2d 610; see People v. Gardeley (1996) 14 Cal.4th 605, 618-619, 59 Cal.Rptr.2d 356, 927 P.2d 713.) Through the posed hypothetical question, the trial court allowed the defense to put before the jury the theory that defendant killed the Garcias while he was in the tweaking stage of a crack cocaine binge. During redirect examination, the defense asked whether the sight of money could act as an environmental cue that would trigger an intense craving in an addict. The trial court restated the question this way: In other words, if a person is an addict, sees money, does that strike that environmental cue that he wants more dope? Dr. Stalcup replied: Judge, it would be as if you hadn't eaten for three days, were very very hungry, and I suddenly put you down in the middle of Sizzler. You would feel, although you were hungry to begin with, you'd feel really hungry then. And even though I don't think you're a thief, if someone wouldn't give you the food, I'll bet you'd grab it and stuff it down your mouth. You'd be out of control. [¶] So the situation of an environmental cue many times, many times I've had patients tell me, doc, I felt like a robot. I felt like I was watching a movie of somebody else. I watched my hands move. I could not control myself.... The cue is the signal that triggers the lust for the drug. The trial court then sustained the prosecutor's objection to a follow-up question by defense counsel asking: And the action of that lust is robot-like? The court acted within its discretion in making this ruling. Although the prosecutor did not state the basis for the objection, or the trial court the basis for its ruling, we infer that the court excluded the proposed testimony as cumulative because Dr. Stalcup had already fully explained a crack cocaine addict's response to an environmental cue, including the testimony that many addicts described the experience as feeling like a robot. To ask whether this feeling was robot-like was merely to request repetition of this testimony. The challenged trial court rulings did not violate state evidence law, nor did they deny defendant his constitutional rights under the federal Constitution. Application of the ordinary rules of evidence generally does not impermissibly infringe on a capital defendant's constitutional rights. ( People v. Kraft (2000) 23 Cal.4th 978, 1035, 99 Cal.Rptr. 2d 1, 5 P.3d 68; accord, People v. Snow (2003) 30 Cal.4th 43, 90, 132 Cal.Rptr.2d 271, 65 P.3d 749; People v. Boyette (2002) 29 Cal.4th 381, 427-428, 127 Cal.Rptr.2d 544, 58 P.3d 391; People v. Gurule (2002) 28 Cal.4th 557, 620, 123 Cal.Rptr.2d 345, 51 P.3d 224.) The rulings did not deprive defendant of a meaningful opportunity to present a defense. (See Crane v. Kentucky (1986) 476 U.S. 683, 690, 106 S.Ct. 2142, 90 L.Ed.2d 636.) In his testimony, the defense expert fully described the nature of crack cocaine addiction and, through hypothetical questions and by other means, related that information to the facts of this case as revealed by the evidence admitted at trial.