Opinion ID: 2599781
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Admission of the Jones and Brunson Statements

Text: Defendant contends that the trial committed reversible error when it admitted statements by prosecution witnesses, William Jones and Anthony Brunson, that defendant argues were inadmissible hearsay. Jones was permitted to testify that Erin Tynan indicated that she preferred muscular African-American men as sexual partners. The trial court admitted the testimony over defendant's objection as relevant to Tynan's state of mind. Brunson, in testifying to his efforts to purchase the Jennings .22-caliber handgun from Tynan, testified that in the fall of 1990, Tynan told him she had the gun. The trial court admitted the testimony over defendant's hearsay objection as nonhearsay evidence of Brunson's conduct, e.g.,' that he continued to seek to purchase the gun from her, relevant to whether she still possessed the gun the night she was murdered. Defendant argues that the errors were both individually and cumulatively prejudicial. The trial court's evidentiary rulings are reviewed for abuse of discretion. ( People v. Jablonski (2006) 37 Cal.4th 774, 821, 38 Cal.Rptr.3d 98, 126 P.3d 938; People v. Rowland (1992) 4 Cal.4th 238, 264, 14 Cal.Rptr.2d 377, 841 P.2d 897 [admissibility of evidence turning on hearsay rule/ state of mind exception subject to abuse of discretion review].) We conclude that the trial court did not abuse its discretion in admitting Jones's testimony and while it erred in admitting Brunson's testimony, the error was harmless. Turning first to Jones's testimony regarding Tynan's indication of her preferences in men, the question is whether that testimony was admissible under the state of mind exception to the hearsay rule set forth in Evidence Code section 1250. In pertinent part, that section permits evidence of a statement of the declarant's then existing state of mind, emotion, or physical sensation ... when [¶] (1) The evidence is offered to prove the declarant's state of mind, emotion, or physical sensation at that time or any other time when it is itself an issue in the action; or [¶] (2) The evidence is offered to prove or explain acts or conduct of the declarant. (Evid. Code, § 1250, subd. (a).) In this case, because there was evidence that defendant had sexual relations with Erin Tynan the night she was killed, the Attorney General argues that the testimony was relevant to the issue of consent; e.g., that, given her preferences, Tynan would not have consented to sexual relations with defendant, who is White. We agree. As we observed in People v. Hernandez (2003) 30 Cal.4th 835, 134 Cal. Rptr.2d 602, 69 P.3d 446, [a] prerequisite to this exception to the hearsay rule is that the declarant's mental state or conduct be factually relevant. ( Id. at p. 872, 134 Cal.Rptr.2d 602, 69 P.3d 446.) Hernandez involved a murder victim's statement a week before he was killed that defendant and two others were going to kill him. As we pointed out, A murder victim's fear of the alleged killer may be in issue when the victim's state of mind is directly relevant to an element of the offense. ( Ibid. ) An example of this principle is found in People v. Thompson (1988) 45 Cal.3d 86, 246 Cal.Rptr. 245, 753 P.2d 37, in which we held that evidence that the murder victim was afraid the defendant would kill her was admissible under the state of mind exception because it went to whether she willingly had intercourse with defendant, which was very much in issue given the prosecution theory of murder during the commission of rape. As her expression of fear of defendant on the very night of the murder tends to indicate she did not consent to intercourse, it was relevant in this case. ( Id. at p. 103, 246 Cal.Rptr. 245, 753 P.2d 37; see People v. Waidla (2000) 22 Cal.4th 690, 723, 94 Cal.Rptr.2d 396, 996 P.2d 46 [the decedent's statement that she feared defendant was relevant to whether the decedent would have consented to the defendant's entry into her residence where burglary and robbery special circumstances were alleged].) Here, as in Thompson, the issue of consent was raised by the charge of forcible rape and the special circumstance allegation that the victim was murdered during the commission of a rape, was put into dispute by defendant's plea of not guilty and remained in dispute until resolved. ( People v. Waidla, supra, 22 Cal.4th at p. 723, 94 Cal.Rptr.2d 396, 996 P.2d 46.) Jones's testimony that Tynan had indicated to him she liked muscular African-American men bore some relevance to whether she would have consented to sexual relations with defendant. Contrary to defendant's assertion, that evidence need not have been dispositive on the issue of consent to have been admissible on that point. (Evid.Code, § 210 [relevant evidence is evidence having any tendency in reason to prove or disprove any disputed fact that is of consequence to the determination of the action].) Defendant's further claim that the evidence was inadmissible to prove the truth of the statement  that Tynan preferred muscular African-American men  is unpersuasive. The evidence admitted under section 1250 is hearsay; it describes a mental or physical condition, intent, plan, or motive and is received for the truth of the matter stated.  ( People v. Ortiz (1995) 38 Cal.App.4th 377, 389, 44 Cal.Rptr.2d 914, italics added.) Accordingly, we conclude that the trial court did not abuse its discretion in admitting Jones's testimony. Even were we to conclude the trial court abused its discretion, we would find the error harmless. Jones's testimony was cumulative to the testimony of Robert Bishop, who had been in a relationship with Erin Tynan. Bishop not only testified, without objection, that Tynan preferred muscular Black men, he acknowledged that he fit this category. Thus, even had Jones's testimony been excluded, the evidence concerning Tynan's preferences was already before the jury. Moreover, in view of the overwhelming evidence that defendant raped and murdered Erin Tynan, admission of this fleeting reference to her predilections in men could have made no difference to the verdict. Rather thornier is resolution of defendant's claim that the trial court abused its discretion when, over the defendant's objection, it admitted Anthony Branson's testimony regarding his attempts to purchase the Jennings .22-handgun left in Tynan's possession by Robert Bishop. In the course of his testimony, Branson testified that Tynan told him she still had the gun. To the extent Branson's testimony related to his own attempts to purchase the gun, that testimony was not hearsay. (Cf. People v. Alvarez (1996) 14 Cal.4th 155, 185, 58 Cal.Rptr.2d 385, 926 P.2d 365 [Hearsay, of course, is evidence of an out-of-court statement offered by its proponent to prove what it states]; Evid.Code, § 1200.) However, his testimony as to what Tynan told him was hearsay and does not appear to have been admissible under any exception to the hearsay rule. Thus, his testimony of her statements that she still possessed the gun should have been excluded. The trial court's failure to exclude the statements, however, is harmless. There was substantial evidence that Tynan was in possession of the gun the night she was killed, including testimony by Jones who left the gun with her in August, that, in October, she told him she wanted to sell it and had a buyer; the testimony of Robert Bishop that he saw a .22-or. 25-caliber semiautomatic in the closet of her bedroom in the fall of 1990, and Detective Griego's testimony that, in the search of her apartment following her murder, he found a .22-caliber cartridge on the top shelf of her bedroom closet, but no gun. There was also, of course, the evidence that defendant was observed shortly after the murder in possession of a similar gun and the testimony of William Blondet, the firearms examiner, that there was a good likelihood the bullet fired at Gail Lebouef was from a Jennings .22-caliber handgun. In view of this evidence, admission of Tynan's hearsay statements to Brunson was not prejudicial. Finally, our conclusion that the admission of the testimony of Jones and Brunson was either not error or, if error, not prejudicial, necessarily disposes of defendant's claim of cumulative prejudice.