Court Opinion

ID: 9781410
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-30 16:36:48.27469+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:34:26.219685
License: Public Domain

MORENO, J.
I concur with the result and the reasoning of the majority, except insofar as it concludes that the religious references made by the prosecutor at the guilt phase of the trial were not misconduct. I would conclude that the prosecutor’s invocation of religion during defendant’s guilt phase trial constituted misconduct, but was not prejudicial, given the strong evidence of defendant’s guilt.
As the majority rightfully acknowledges, we have repeatedly held that a prosecutor may not appeal to religious authority in a closing argument to the jury. (Maj. opn., ante, at p. 247.) I agree with the majority that “[wjhen references to the Bible are involved, the line between literary allusion and religious appeal is often a fine one.” (Id., at p. 248.) I believe that the prosecutorial argument at issue here, however, falls squarely on the wrong side of that line.
The majority opinion quotes at length the pertinent portion of the prosecutor’s argument invoking the Bible, and I therefore need not quote it in full here. (See maj. opn., ante, at pp. 246-247.) Of particular significance are the prosecutor’s extended metaphor invoking the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse (see Revelation 6:1-6:8), his description of defendant as “the disciple of Satan,” and his charge to the jury to “take the sword from [defendant] and cast it down and tell him that he was wrong and may go no further.” (Maj. opn., ante, at p. 247.)
The majority is correct to note that “not every reference to the Bible is an appeal to religious authority.” (Maj. opn., ante, at p. 248.) Literary allusion, which is by definition “a covert, implied, or indirect reference” to a work of *262literature (1 Oxford English Dict. (2d ed. 1989) p. 349), is permissible in closing argument even when the work of literature alluded to is the Bible. Indeed, counsel would be well within the bounds of permissible argument if he or she referred to a skeptical expert witness as a “doubting Thomas” (John 20:24-20:28), or called someone a “good Samaritan.” (Luke 10:33-10:34.)
However, extended references to biblical passages that explicitly relate principles or illustrations from the Bible to the case at hand go well beyond mere allusion. While it is true that the Bible is “generally regarded as a literary masterpiece” (maj. opn., ante, at p. 248), it is clearly more than a work of literature to many potential jurors who may believe the Bible to be divinely inspired. As such, any extended reference to the Bible can be expected to carry an inherent authority behind it that illustrations drawn from Dickens, Shakespeare, or J.K. Rowling could not. To pretend otherwise would be to ignore the reality that, to many people, the Bible is not just a literary work but a holy text.
Although the majority correctly notes that “any use of biblical references in argument must be carefully scrutinized” (maj. opn., ante, at p. 248, italics added), it then concludes that “a reasonable juror likely would understand the prosecutor’s biblical references merely as a powerfully dramatic illustration of the gravity and enormity of defendant’s crimes.” I am unpersuaded.
An argument need not directly tell jurors to supplant the state’s law with God’s law to invoke religious authority. The prosecutorial argument at issue here was not only biblical in style and substance, but made an explicit and extended comparison between defendant and the Four Horsemen and called defendant a “disciple of Satan.” Indeed, the aim of the prosecutor’s extended, albeit somewhat confusing, comparison between defendant and the Horsemen appears to be that defendant, unlike the Horsemen, lacked “the necessary mandate” to kill. In contrast, though the prosecutor did not directly urge the jury to follow religious law rather than California law, he did suggest that, unlike defendant, the jury had a divine mandate, if not a religious obligation, to “cast . . . down” defendant and to judge him guilty. In addition, using language strongly evocative of biblical passages, the prosecutor charged the jury with a mandate to “take the sword from [defendant] and cast it down and tell him that he was wrong and he may go no further.” This extended metaphor was an invitation to the jury to apply a “higher law than that found in the California Penal Code.” (Maj. opn., ante, at p. 247.)
*263Because I believe that the prosecutor’s closing argument at the guilt phase crossed the line between permissible allusion to the Bible and impermissible religious exhortation, I would conclude that the argument was improper.
Werdegar, J., concurred.
Appellant’s petition for a rehearing was denied May 18, 2005.