Court Opinion

ID: 9561432
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 18:09:46.908585+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:13:48.325616
License: Public Domain

KENNARD, J., Concurring and Dissenting.
I concur in the judgment. I write separately to emphasize that the authority of trial courts to comment on the evidence is subject to strict limitations and must be exercised with extreme caution, and to express my view that, consistent with this court’s well-established case law, factor (j) of Penal Code section 190.3 cannot be an aggravating circumstance.
I.
Our Constitution (Cal. Const., art. VI, § 10), as well as our statutes (Pen. Code, §§ 1093, subd. (f), 1127), grant trial courts the authority to comment on the testimony and credibility of witnesses. But there is a countervailing consideration. The Constitutions of both the United States (U.S. Const., Amend. VI) and the State of California (Cal. Const., art. I, § 16) also grant a criminal defendant the right to a jury trial, and that right requires that the jury be the exclusive arbiter of questions of fact and the credibility of witnesses. (See e.g., People v. Rodriguez (1986) 42 Cal.3d 730, 766 [230 Cal.Rptr. 667, 726 P.2d 113]; People v. Friend (1958) 50 Cal.2d 570, 577-578 [327 P.2d 97]; People v. Ottey (1936) 5 Cal.2d 714, 728 [56 P.2d 193].)
There is an inherent tension between the authority of a trial court to comment on the evidence and the right of a criminal defendant to a jury trial. A court’s exercise of its authority to comment on the evidence always poses the danger of a violation of the right to jury trial. Because a judge presiding *557over a trial necessarily has substantial influence on the jury (Bollenbach v. United States (1946) 326 U.S. 607, 612 [90 L.Ed. 350, 354, 66 S.Ct. 402]), every judicial comment on the evidence carries with it an appreciable risk that the jury may discount its own view of the evidence in deference to the judge’s opinion. (People v. Cook (1983) 33 Cal.3d 400, 407 [189 Cal.Rptr. 159, 658 P.2d 86].) Therefore, in the interest of protecting the right to jury trial while giving efficacy to our state Constitution’s grant of authority to comment on the evidence, appellate courts have imposed strict limitations on the trial court’s authority to comment.
Thus, a trial court’s comments on the evidence must be “necessary for a proper determination of the cause.” (Cal. Const., art. VI, § 10.) They must assist, not coerce, the jury. (People v. Rodriguez, supra, 42 Cal.3d at pp. 767-768.) The court must inform the jurors that they are the exclusive judges of all questions of fact and of the credibility of witnesses. (Pen. Code, § 1127; People v. Brock (1967) 66 Cal.2d 645, 651 [58 Cal.Rptr. 321, 426 P.2d 889].) The comments must be made with a view to protecting the rights of the defendant. (People v. Brock, supra, 66 Cal.2d at p. 650.) They must be accurate, temperate, scrupulously fair, and made with wisdom and restraint. (People v. Cook, supra, 33 Cal.3d at p. 408.) The comments may not (1) be argumentative (ibid.); (2) distort the law or the record (People v. Brock, supra, 66 Cal.2d at p. 650; People v. Friend, supra, 50 Cal.2d at p. 577); (3) withdraw evidence from the jury’s consideration (People v. Brock, supra, at p. 650); (4) expressly or impliedly direct a verdict (People v. Cook, supra, 33 Cal.3d at p. 408; People v. Brock, supra, 66 Cal.2d at p. 650); or (5) express a view on the ultimate issue of guilt or innocence (People v. Melton (1988) 44 Cal.3d 713, 735 [244 Cal.Rptr. 867, 750 P.2d 741]).
In this case, the trial court’s comments came perilously close, but did not cross, the line between permissible jury assistance and prohibited coercion. The court made its remarks without notice to counsel and after it was aware that the jury had deadlocked 11 to 1. The comments, however, were accurate and did not distort the record. Immediately before and after the comments, the court reminded the jury that it was the exclusive arbiter of questions of fact and the credibility of the witnesses, and that it was free to disregard any or all of the trial court’s comments. The jury then continued its deliberations for approximately four hours. (Compare People v. Cook, supra, 33 Cal.3d at p. 406 [jury returned verdict 14 minutes after trial court’s comments].)
On balance, giving consideration to all of the circumstances in which the trial court’s comments were made (People v. Melton, supra, 44 Cal.3d at p. 735) in the context of the existing state of the law (see People v. Rodriguez, supra, 42 Cal.3d at pp. 765-770), I agree with the majority’s conclusion that *558the trial court’s comments were within the scope of its authority under article VI, section 10 of the state Constitution. I emphasize, however, that a trial court’s option to comment on the evidence should be exercised, if at all, only with great caution.
II.
As a result of numerous decisions of this court in recent years, it is now well established that the circumstance described in factor (j) of Penal Code section 190.3 (hereafter factor (j)) can only be mitigating. Yet the majority now treats this issue as unresolved (see maj. opn„ ante, p. 553), even though it was resolved years ago. In so doing, the majority injects a harmful and entirely needless uncertainty into the center of our death penalty law.
Factor (j) directs the jury in the penalty phase of a capital case to consider “[wjhether or not the defendant was an accomplice to the offense and his participation in the commission of the offense was relatively minor” in deciding whether to impose the death penalty. Thus, if the defendant is an accomplice whose role in the offense was relatively minor, the jurors must consider this fact as a circumstance in mitigation, although they are free to give it whatever weight they deem appropriate. If these conditions are not satisfied, factor (j) is inapplicable, as the defendant’s conduct in this regard is not “more serious than ‘normal’ ” for a person who has been convicted of murder with special circumstances. (People v. Daniels (1991) 52 Cal.3d 815, 889 [277 Cal.Rptr. 122, 802 P.2d 906]; People v. Burton (1989) 48 Cal.3d 843, 864-865 [258 Cal.Rptr. 184, 771 P.2d 1270]; People v. Adcox (1988) 47 Cal.3d 207, 273 [253 Cal.Rptr. 55, 763 P.2d 906]; People v. Siripongs (1988) 45 Cal.3d 548, 583 [247 Cal.Rptr. 729, 754 P.2d 1306]; see also People v. Davenport (1985) 41 Cal.3d 247, 289-290 [221 Cal.Rptr. 794, 710 P.2d 861].)
When, as here, the defendant is the sole perpetrator of the murder, factor (j) does not apply, as this court has held on numerous occasions. (People v. Daniels, supra, 52 Cal.3d at p. 889; People v. Hamilton (1989) 48 Cal.3d 1142, 1184 [259 Cal.Rptr. 701, 774 P.2d 730]; People v. Hernandez (1988) 47 Cal.3d 315, 364 [253 Cal.Rptr. 199, 763 P.2d 1289]; People v. Karis (1988) 46 Cal.3d 612, 652 [250 Cal.Rptr. 659, 758 P.2d 1189]; People v. Brown (1988) 46 Cal.3d 432, 455-456 & fn. 10 [250 Cal.Rptr. 604, 758 P.2d 1135]; People v. Siripongs, supra, 45 Cal.3d at p. 583; see also People v. Gallego (1990) 52 Cal.3d 115, 200 [276 Cal.Rptr. 679, 802 P.2d 169]; People v. Gonzalez (1990) 51 Cal.3d 1179, 1233-12349 [275 Cal.Rptr. 729, 800 P.2d 1159]; People v. Burton, supra, 48 Cal.3d at pp. 864-865; People v. Adcox, supra, 47 Cal.3d at p. 273; People v. Walker (1988) 47 Cal.3d 605, *559643-644 [253 Cal.Rptr. 863, 765 P.2d 70]; People v. Moore (1988) 47 Cal.3d 63, 92 & fn. 13 [252 Cal.Rptr. 494, 762 P.2d 1218].)
The majority puts in doubt the continuing validity of all these cases by asserting that they are now in “apparent conflict” with People v. Howard (1992) 1 Cal.4th 1132, 1195 [5 Cal.Rptr.2d 268, 824 P.2d 1315]. But the opinion in Howard provided no reasoning or analysis to support the one sentence in that opinion that is arguably inconsistent with this otherwise unbroken line of authority, nor did it discuss or even acknowledge any of the contrary decisions listed above. The suggestion in Howard that factor (j) can be aggravating carries no persuasive force and should therefore be disapproved.
In People v. Hernandez, supra, 47 Cal.3d 315, 364, this court said that because the defendant in that case was the sole perpetrator of the murders, factor G) “obviously did not apply . . . .” What was obvious to a unanimous court in Hernandez has become obscure to the current majority, and for no good reason. The mandate of this court is to settle important questions of law (Cal. Rules of Court, rule 29(a)), not to unsettle them. I decline to join the majority in unsettling the proper meaning and scope of factor G).