Court Opinion

ID: 9598889
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 01:13:00.49292+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:01:43.272774
License: Public Domain

RICHARDSON, J.
I concur in the judgment, under the compulsion of People v. Graham (1969) 71 Cal.2d 303 [78 Cal.Rptr. 217, 455 P.2d 153]. But for Graham and its progeny, we might well conclude that de*337fense counsel’s failure to request instructions on second degree murder was a deliberate, tactical decision, constituting invited error which would cure the trial court’s omission to give those instructions sua sponte. The record appears to support a finding that the defense counsel deliberately narrowed the jury’s choice of verdicts to first degree murder, involuntary manslaughter, and excusable homicide.
Yet Graham requires that the record reveal that counsel actually "expresse[d] a deliberate tactical purpose in suggesting, resisting, or acceding to an instruction .... ” (P. 319, italics added.) As the majority correctly states, defense counsel herein expressed to the trial court no tactical purpose in foregoing instructions on second degree murder. Accordingly, under Graham, no basis exists for finding invited error.
In my view, the Graham rule should be reconsidered and possibly discarded in favor of a rule which would permit a finding of invited error based upon reasonable inferences drawn from the record. (See People v. Tidwell (1970) 3 Cal.3d 82, 87 [89 Cal.Rptr. 58, 473 P.2d 762].) Lacking majority support for reconsideration of Graham, however, I concur in the judgment under its compulsion.
Respondent’s petition for a rehearing was denied October 21, 1982. Richardson, J., was of the opinion that the petition should be granted.