Opinion ID: 2594806
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Effect of Sanity and Guilt Phase Errors

Text: Defendant renews two claims of error from the sanity and guilt phases of his trial and argues that, if not prejudicial at those stages of the proceeding, they were prejudicial at the penalty phase. First, he claims that Dr. Wilkinson's serial killer testimony improperly prejudiced his case in mitigation. Since we have concluded that the admission of Dr. Wilkinson's testimony was not error, defendant was necessarily not prejudiced. But even had we found that the trial court abused its discretion in admitting the testimony, we would reject defendant's claim that such error undermined the reliability of the death verdict. ( People v. Mickle (1991) 54 Cal.3d 140, 197, 284 Cal.Rptr. 511, 814 P.2d 290.) Defendant's long history of violence against women in his birth family (his sister and mother), his wives or women with whom he was in a domestic relationship (Alice McGowan, Jane S., Linda Kimball, Carol Spadoni), the mothers of those women (Isobel Pahls, Eva Petersen), acquaintances (Marsha S., Mary M., Fathyma Vann), and total strangers (Eileen Millsap, Margie Rogers) was voluminous, graphic and compelling. In contrast to the evidence in aggravation, the mitigating evidence was weak. We are not persuaded that labeling defendant a serial killer  assuming only for argument's sake that this label was in any way inappropriate  unfairly tipped the scale at the penalty phase. We also reject defendant's second claim that the admission of his pretrial statement to police prejudiced him in the penalty phase because it prevented him from testifying. Defendant asserts he could have testified to his mental state not only during the charged crimes, but at the time of the other offenses used as evidence in aggravation. Again, since we have concluded the statement was voluntary and its admission was not error, there is no foundation for his claim of prejudice. Alternatively, we again conclude that, even if its admission was error, in light of the whole record, it is not reasonably possible that the jury would have returned a different penalty verdict but for the assumed error. ( People v. Ervin (2000) 22 Cal.4th 48, 103, 91 Cal.Rptr.2d 623, 990 P.2d 506.)