Opinion ID: 1345760
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: the prejudice

Text: As in Ramkeesoon ( supra, 39 Cal.3d at pp. 351-353), the error is prejudicial in the circumstances of this case. Defendant's testimony that the fight erupted when decedent attempted to attack him sexually was plausible under the other evidence in the case. The crucial factual issue presented by the case, since defendant admitted killing and stealing, was the time defendant formed the intent to steal. [1] Defendant testified that decedent attempted to rape him, that he responded using his buck knife to stab decedent, that they fought as he continued to cut and stab decedent, and that it was only after he found decedent dead that he decided to steal anything. There was circumstantial evidence that supported defendant's testimony. Thus, there was circumstantial evidence that in hiring defendant, who had a full-time job and lived in another city, to do gardening work, decedent may have had an ulterior sexual motive. I do not understand the majority to argue otherwise. (See maj. opn., ante, at p. 689.) There was also the evidence that decedent ejaculated. The prosecution presented expert testimony that ejaculation has been known to occur immediately prior to death, apparently when no sexual activity was involved. This evidence precluded the ejaculation evidence from being conclusive on the sexual-conduct issue but did not mean that the ejaculation evidence was not entitled to substantial weight in evaluating defendant's claim that decedent attacked him. The majority fail to mention that decedent was six feet three inches tall and suffered from a weight problem. The evidence is important to the defense because it suggests that decedent probably would have been able to subdue defendant in a physical attack in the absence of any weapon. (But cf. maj. opn., ante, at p. 689.) The omitted fact takes on much more importance when it is considered in the light of the prosecution's version of the facts. Both the prosecution and the defense evidence established that decedent knew defendant and knew where to find him. The prosecution theory was that defendant determined to rob decedent and determined to kill him so that he could steal decedent's possessions. Defendant's weapon was a knife, which requires close combat. It is difficult to believe that defendant formed the intent to rob and kill before he left Fresno for Merced in view of his weapon and the size of decedent. After defendant was introduced to and spoke at length with decedent's friends and acquaintances, there is little likelihood that he formed the intent to rob when he could be easily identified by decedent's friends and acquaintances. Further, it must be obvious to even the stupidest of criminals that the knife attack had to be successful on the first stab because if there was a protracted battle decedent's large stature and weight might prove determinative. Yet there was no evidence of the deep knife wound which would be expected if defendant had initiated the violent confrontation. The majority characterize as implausible defendant's testimony that he only stole the television set from the house and did not steal the other personal property missing from the house. (See maj. opn., ante, at pp. 689-690.) There was some corroborative evidence that there was a second theft. Decedent's head was found resting on a pillow. Despite all of the blood on decedent, in the area and on defendant, there was no blood on the pillow, suggesting that it had been placed there after the blood had dried but before the body was discovered. In addition, although police officers searched for the missing personal property, including searching defendant's home, they were unable to find any of it, apart from the television and the automobile. Finally, after the locks were changed on decedent's house following the killing, a broken key was found in the new front door lock, suggesting that some unidentified person had access to decedent's home. While the above evidence indicating that there may have been a second theft may not be strongly persuasive, the evidence pointed to by the majority as indicating that the intent to steal was formed before the killing is, at least, equally weak. Moreover, the evidence relied upon by the majority could also be viewed consistently with defendant's claim that he formed the intent to steal after decedent was dead, and that the evidence does not show that defendant decided to rob and kill when he could be so easily identified and located. Based on the evidence before the jury, an error in the instructions tilting the jury in favor of finding that defendant formed his intent to steal before the killing has to be prejudicial. The evidence that defendant formed the intent to steal before the fight is not overwhelming; it is not compelling or even very persuasive. On the record before us, the conclusion that he killed in order to steal is barely plausible. It is likely that a properly instructed jury would have found theft rather than robbery. The majority argue that the errors were not prejudicial because the jury resolved the issue of the time the intent to rob occurred under other, proper instructions. However, the jury findings under those instructions were the product of the errors and may not properly be relied upon to eliminate the prejudice resulting from the errors. In People v. Sedeno (1974) 10 Cal.3d 703, 721 [112 Cal. Rptr. 1, 518 P.2d 913], it was pointed out that in some circumstances it is possible to determine that although an instruction on a lesser included offense was erroneously omitted, the factual question posed by the omitted instruction was necessarily resolved adversely to the defendant under other, properly given instructions. In such cases the issue should not be deemed to have been removed from the jury's consideration since it has been resolved in another context, and there can be no prejudice to the defendant since the evidence that would support a finding that only a lesser offense has been committed has been rejected by the jury. The Sedeno rule has been applied in other cases of failure to instruct on a lesser included offense. ( People v. Melton, supra, 44 Cal.3d 713, 746; People v. Ramkeesoon, supra, 39 Cal.3d 346, 351-353; see also People v. Bean (1988) 46 Cal.3d 919, 951 [251 Cal. Rptr. 467, 760 P.2d 996]; People v. Miranda (1987) 44 Cal.3d 57, 92 [241 Cal. Rptr. 594, 744 P.2d 1127].) In Sedeno, supra, 10 Cal.3d 703, there was error in the failure to instruct on involuntary manslaughter based on the defendant's diminished capacity defense, but it was concluded that the failure to instruct was not prejudicial to the issue of intent to kill because the jury, when it concluded that the offense was first degree murder rather than second degree, necessarily rejected defendant's evidence that diminished capacity negated intent to kill. Under that determination, the offense could not have been less than voluntary manslaughter. In Melton, the defendant argued that properly instructed the jury might have found that the intent to steal arose after the assault making the crime theft rather than robbery. The error in failing to instruct was found nonprejudicial because the jury had found burglary under instructions that the entry to the victim's residence must have been for the purpose of theft or robbery and the entry to the residence occurred prior to the assault. Thus, the jury had determined that the intent to steal arose prior to the assault. (44 Cal.3d at p. 746.) However, when the subsequent instructions are merely repetitive of the incomplete instructions, it cannot be said that the jury has necessarily resolved the issue in another context under proper instructions. Our unanimous decision in People v. Ramkeesoon, supra, 39 Cal.3d 346, 352, is squarely on point. There, defendant testified that he had been invited to decedent's home, that he refused an invitation to go to bed with the victim, that the victim attacked him, that a struggle ensued during which he stabbed the victim several times, and that only after he took a shower to wash the blood away did it occur to him to steal. Theft instructions were erroneously omitted and robbery and felony-murder instructions were given. The fact that the jury found not only robbery but also robbery-murder did not eliminate the prejudice flowing from the error. The unanimous opinion pointed out that the omission of the theft instructions practically guaranteed robbery and felony-murder convictions since defendant had admitted taking [decedent's] property and robbery was the only available theft offense. Similarly, in People v. Morales (1975) 49 Cal. App.3d 134, 139-141 [122 Cal. Rptr. 157], it was held that a verdict of robbery and of felony murder did not necessarily resolve the question that would have been properly presented by instructions on grand theft from the person, whether the force used in snatching the victim's purse was sufficient for robbery. In the instant case, we cannot say that the jury determined in another context that the intent to steal arose before the assault. The majority first rely upon the detailed robbery instructions as showing that the theft issue was necessarily determined by the jury. Those instructions made it clear that the jury must find that defendant intended to steal prior to the use of force. However, the prejudice involved in a failure to instruct on the lesser offense is not based on a failure of the jurors to find the elements of the greater offense, as in the instant case, that the intent to steal arose before the fight. The jurors in such cases obviously found the elements of the greater offense. The prejudice lies in the danger that the jurors, to avoid acquittal of a confessed felon, leaned over backward to find the elements of the greater offense. When there is an error in failing to instruct on a lesser included offense, the prejudice is not eliminated by proper instructions on the elements of the greater offense. For example, in People v. Wickersham (1982) 32 Cal.3d 307, 335-336 [185 Cal. Rptr. 436, 650 P.2d 311], the jury convicted the defendant of first degree premeditated and deliberate murder after the trial court erroneously omitted instructions on the lesser included offense of second degree murder. It was held that `the factual question posed by the omitted instruction' โ whether appellant had acted with malice and intent, but without premeditation and deliberation โ was not `necessarily resolved adversely to the defendant under other, properly given instructions.' ( Sedeno, supra, 10 Cal.3d at p. 721.) The jury's determination based on the elements of the greater offense is not a determination in another context as occurred in Sedeno, supra, 10 Cal.3d 703, and Melton, supra, 44 Cal.3d 713. Use of the instructions on the elements of the greater offense to eliminate prejudice resulting from erroneous omission to instruct on the lesser would mean that the error was never prejudicial unless there was also error in the instructions on the elements of the greater. Detailed instructions on the elements of the greater offense do not eliminate or minimize the all-or-nothing choice given to the jury by the failure to instruct on the lesser. The felony-murder instruction and the special circumstance instruction next relied upon by the majority both were tied to the issue of robbery rather than some other offense or theft. The factual issue as to when the intent to steal occurred was the same under the robbery, the felony-murder, and the special circumstance instructions, and the jury, having determined that the intent to steal arose before the fight under fundamentally unfair instructions, could not thereafter consistently have found that the intent to steal occurred later or that there was no felony murder or special circumstance. In both Sedeno and Melton, the tainted finding did not compel the findings relied upon to eliminate prejudice. Thus, in Sedeno the failure to instruct on involuntary manslaughter tainted the finding of intentional homicide, but it did not compel the jury findings of premeditation and deliberation. The jury could, consistent with the tainted finding, find second degree murder, and since the jury was free to reject premeditation and deliberation it was appropriate to rely upon the findings of premeditation and deliberation to show that the error in failing to instruct on involuntary manslaughter was not prejudicial. In Melton the tainted determination of robbery that the intent to steal arose before the homicide did not require a determination that the intent to steal arose prior to entry of the house. Because consistent with the tainted finding the jury could reject burglary, the finding of burglary was not the product of the error, and it was proper to rely upon the finding to show that the tainted finding was not prejudicial. It is simply not logical to use the products of the error to dispel the prejudice arising from the error, as the majority does. Moreover, the majority offer no valid basis to distinguish the unanimous decision in Ramkeesoon. It is improper to speculate that the instructions in that case on robbery and felony murder failed to set forth the elements of the offenses. If the instructions were incomplete the court in reversing the convictions obviously would have mentioned the fact. The prejudice flowing from a failure to instruct on a lesser included offense, as we have seen, is that the jury, given the choice between conviction of the greater offense and outright acquittal, when the evidence obviously establishes some offense, is likely to resolve its doubts in favor of conviction in violation of our most fundamental rule of criminal law. In the instant case, the jury was never given an option to find that defendant's offense was theft rather than robbery and that therefore there was no felony murder or special circumstance. Repetitious instructions on the elements of the greater offense do not eliminate the prejudice. The manifest unfairness of the original instruction as to the time the intent to steal occurred carried over to the subsequent instructions. Accordingly, the failure to instruct on theft was prejudicial. The judgment should be reversed.