Court Opinion

ID: 9542224
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 16:32:08.019243+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:07:09.515300
License: Public Domain

BAXTER, J.
I concur. The majority correctly affirm the judgment of the Court of Appeal. Defendant Debra Jane Bray’s conviction of the first degree murder of Gaylord Van Camp was predicated on her criminal liability as an aider and abettor of her codefendant, Richard D. Prettyman. She became a principal in the crime thereby, the record evidence is sufficient to support the jury’s verdict finding her guilty of first degree murder, and there was no reversible error in the instructions given on which that verdict was based.
I disagree, however, with the rationale by which the majority find harmless the trial court’s giving of an instruction on the “natural and probable consequences” doctrine on its own motion. I agree with the views of Justice *284Mosk on the point—in so instructing the jury the trial court plainly erred, but the nature of the error is not that the instruction given set forth the “natural and probable consequences” doctrine in legally incorrect terms for the jury. Rather, the instruction was simply surplusage, unrequested by the People, and without any direct factual applicability to the People’s case-in-chief. (People v. Rowland (1992) 4 Cal.4th 238, 282, & fn. 21 at pp. 282-283 [14 Cal.Rptr.2d 377, 841 P.2d 897].) As such, although to so instruct the jmy was error, it did not implicate Bray’s rights under the United States Constitution, nor can it be said to have resulted in a “miscarriage of justice” within the meaning of the California Constitution. (Cal. Const., art. VI, § 13.) I would therefore simply find that it is not reasonably probable a result more favorable to the defendant would have been reached had the trial court refrained from giving the superfluous instruction. (People v. Watson (1956) 46 Cal.2d 818, 837 [299 P.2d 243].)
It should be understood that the majority’s holding today only obligates a trial court to instruct on the “natural and probable consequences” doctrine where the prosecution expressly advises the court that it is relying upon that theory of liability, and that the trial court need only further “describe” the target offense or offenses for the jmy where the prosecutor then identifies for the court those target offenses upon which it is relying.1 This does not, to my mind, set forth a classic “sua sponte” duty to instruct on the part of the trial court. Indeed, where it becomes apparent that a trial court has erroneously or mistakenly instructed on the “natural and probable consequences” doctrine on its own motion, in contravention of the People’s theory of its case-in-chief, either the People or the defendant might be expected to, and should be permitted to object to any further instructions on the doctrine, and indeed, request that the jury be admonished to disregard the erroneous instruction.

Although, as noted, the majority does make clear at places in the opinion that a prosecutor must request instruction on the “natural and probable consequences” doctrine, and must further advise the court of the target offense or offenses on which it is relying on (maj. opn., ante, at pp. 267, 269), the majority still label the duty placed on the trial court under the holding of this case as a “sua sponte” one (id. at p. 269), and unfortunately, several passages remain in the majority opinion which might mistakenly be read to suggest that the trial court’s duty to instruct under today’s holding is a sua sponte duty in the classic sense of that term (id. at p. 266).