Court Opinion

ID: 9587367
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 23:21:22.638638+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:38:14.700713
License: Public Domain

KENNARD, J., Concurring and Dissenting.
I concur in the majority’s affirmance of the jury’s special circumstance finding, but I dissent from its affirmance of the judgment of death.
The United States Supreme Court has held that, for a death sentence to comport with the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments of the federal Constitution, the defendant in a capital case must be permitted to present “any and all relevant mitigating evidence that is available.” (Skipper v. South Carolina (1985) 476 U.S. 1, 8 [90 L.Ed.2d 1, 9, 106 S.Ct. 1669]; Eddings v. Oklahoma (1982) 455 U.S. 104, 117 [71 L.Ed.2d 1, 12-13, 102 S.Ct. 869]; Lockett v. Ohio (1978) 438 U.S. 586, 604 [57 L.Ed.2d 973, 990, 98 S.Ct. 2954].) Here the trial court failed to comply with this requirement when it precluded defendant from explaining why he deserved to live. Justice Mosk points out in his concurring and dissenting opinion that unless this court can declare its belief that the error, which is of federal constitutional dimension, was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt, reversal of the penalty judgment is required. I agree. I write separately, however, to expand on the *671essential flaw in the majority’s refusal to consider whether the error might have affected the jury’s decision to impose the death penalty, and to show that, contrary to the majority’s determination, the record adequately reveals the nature of the mitigating evidence defendant was precluded from presenting.
Discussion
Under California law, error in a criminal case is considered harmless unless the defendant can show it resulted in a “miscarriage of justice.” (Cal. Const., art. VI, § 13; People v. Archerd (1970) 3 Cal.3d 615, 643 [91 Cal.Rptr. 397, 477 P.2d 421].) This means the defendant must demonstrate that without the error “it is reasonably probable a result more favorable” to the defendant would have been reached. (People v. Watson (1956) 46 Cal.2d 818, 836 [299 P.2d 243].) In Chapman v. California (1966) 386 U.S. 18, 23-24 [17 L.Ed.2d 705, 710-711, 87 S.Ct. 824, 24 A.L.R.3d 1065], the United States Supreme Court rejected California’s “miscarriage of justice” test as inappropriate for evaluating federal constitutional error. Under Chapman, “the beneficiary of a [federal] constitutional error” must prove beyond a reasonable doubt “that the error complained of did not contribute to the verdict obtained.” (Ibid. [17 L.Ed.2d 705, 710-711].) Thus, when the error violates the federal Constitution, the defendant need not show prejudice; rather, the prosecution must establish the absence of prejudice.
In this case, the majority acknowledges that by precluding defendant from answering the question, “Why do you deserve to live?,” the trial court denied defendant his right to have the jury consider aspects of his character from which it might have drawn favorable inferences bearing on “his probable future conduct if sentenced to life in prison.” (Skipper v. South Carolina, supra, 476 U.S. 1, 4 [906 L.Ed.2d 1, 7].) (Maj. opn., ante, p. 647.) We apply the Chapman test to a finding of “Skipper” error. (People v. Lucero (1988) 44 Cal.3d 1006, 1032 [245 Cal.Rptr. 185, 750 P.2d 1342].) Here, because defendant did not make an offer of proof concerning the specific content of the mitigating evidence he tried to present, the majority reasons that it cannot, and thus need not, decide whether the error prejudiced defendant’s penalty phase case. I disagree.
As noted earlier, under Chapman, supra, 386 U.S. 18, 24 [17 L.Ed.2d 705, 710-711], federal constitutional error is prejudicial and requires reversal unless the reviewing court can ascertain from the record that the error was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt. The prosecution has the burden of showing that the error did not contribute to the verdict. To condition an evaluation of federal constitutional error on a defendant’s offer of proof, as the majority does, relieves the beneficiary of the error (the prosecution) of *672the obligation to demonstrate that the error did not affect the verdict, and impermissibly shifts to the defendant the burden of proving prejudice. The majority cites no authority to support its radical departure from Chapman.
Neither of the two authorities on which the majority relies, Luce v. United States (1984) 469 U.S. 38 [83 L.Ed.2d 443, 105 S.Ct. 460] and Evidence Code section 354, concerns error in violation of the federal Constitution.1 Nor do these authorities require an offer of proof when the record establishes federal constitutional error.
Even if the majority’s requirement of an offer of proof as to what defendant would have testified to is a proper condition before evaluating whether the error was prejudicial, the record here adequately reveals the nature of such testimony. (See Pacific Gas and Electric Co. v. G. W. Thomas Drayage Co. (1968) 69 Cal.2d 33, 36, fn. 1 [69 Cal.Rptr. 561, 442 P.2d 641, 40 A.L.R.3d 1373]; Lawless v. Calaway (1944) 24 Cal.2d 81, 91 [147 P.2d 604].) The majority, therefore, could have determined prejudice in this case.
The thrust of the defense strategy at the penalty phase was defendant’s religious conversion on death row. As the majority explains, this strategy was “apparent” from “counsel’s direct examination of inmates Sanders and Payton,” from counsel’s unsuccessful efforts to introduce into evidence “the Dove Cage magazine containing a ‘Death Row’ interview with defendant,” and from the emphasis in counsel’s closing argument that defendant was “ ‘not the same man’ a jury had sentenced to death four years earlier.” (Maj. opn., ante, p. 641.) Under these circumstances, defense counsel’s obvious purpose in asking defendant why he deserved to live was to put before the jury defendant’s personal account of his religious conversion.
Because “imposition of death by public authority is so profoundly different from all other penalties,” the United States Supreme Court has stressed “the need for treating each defendant in a capital case with that degree of respect due the uniqueness of the individual . . . .” (Lockett v. Ohio, supra, 438 U.S. 586, 605 [57 L.Ed.2d 973, 990].) Although in this case *673the jury knew from the testimony of inmates Payton and Sanders about defendant’s religious activities in prison, only defendant himself could have conveyed to the jury the depth of the change he claimed to have undergone. Singular import is accorded “an accused’s right to present his own version of events in his own words.” (Rock v. Arkansas (1987) 483 U.S. 44, 52 [97 L.Ed.2d 37, 47, 107 S.Ct. 2704].) When, as here, the defendant’s version of the facts would have been a personal account of how Christianity had transformed his life, offered to establish mitigation at the penalty phase of a capital case, such evidence cannot be considered cumulative.
I would reverse the judgment of death.
Appellant’s petition for a rehearing was denied December 20, 1990. Mosk, J., Broussard, J., and Kennard, J., were of the opinion that the petition should be granted.

Luce v. United States, supra, 469 U.S. 38, 42-43 [83 L.Ed.2d 443, 448-449], involves asserted error “not reaching constitutional dimensions” based on the trial court’s denial of a defense motion to prohibit the prosecution from using a prior conviction to impeach the defendant.
Evidence Code section 354 provides that no judgment shall be reversed based on the improper exclusion of evidence, unless the substance, purpose, and relevance of the excluded evidence was made known to the trial court. It expressly applies only to error reviewable for “a miscarriage of justice,” the standard of error set forth in the California Constitution. As noted earlier, the United States Supreme Court held this test to be inappropriate in evaluating error in violation of the federal Constitution. (Chapman v. California, supra, 386 U.S. 18, 24 [17 L.Ed.2d 705,710-711].)