 |
 |
to fill out a simple form to connect to DUI Lawyers in your area.
|
|
|
|
|
People v. Steele5/30/2002
on.]' " (People v. Bolin, supra, 18 Cal.4th at pp. 331-332.)
Here, Anderson guides our assessment quite effectively, for all three categories of evidence exist. As to planning, the jury could infer that defendant carried the fatal knife into the victim's home in his pocket, which makes it "reasonable to infer that he considered the possibility of homicide from the outset." (People v. Alcala (1984) 36 Cal.3d 604, 626.) This inference is much stronger in this case, because defendant had already stabbed another woman to death. When a person stabs a woman to death, then leads another woman into her apartment with a knife in the pocket, the jury can readily infer that the person possessed the knife for the same purpose. Additionally, as the trial court noted when it denied defendant's motion to dismiss the first degree murder charge, Richard Blakeslee testified that when he was speaking with "Lee Ann," whom the jury could reasonably have found was the victim, he heard defendant say, "Put the phone down or I'll kill you." This evidence suggests a planned killing. Defendant argues Blakeslee's testimony was not credible, but the jury could reasonably have believed it.
As to motive, defendant told the police that he hated women. This statement, combined with the fact he had once before killed a young woman of somewhat similar appearance, provides strong evidence of motive. Finally, defendant stabbed the victim about eight times in the chest and strangled her. Previously, he had killed another woman in almost the same distinctive manner. This manner of killing, and doing so the same way twice, "supports the inference of a calculated design to ensure death, rather than an unconsidered `explosion' of violence." (People v. Alcala, supra, 36 Cal.3d at p. 627.) "Under all the circumstances, we find ample evidence of premeditation and deliberation." (Ibid.)
4. Instructional Issues
Defendant contends the trial court committed several instructional errors.
a. CALJIC No. 8.73
The court instructed the jury on first and second degree murder and voluntary manslaughter due to provocation. Although questioning whether the evidence warranted manslaughter instructions, the district attorney stated he was requesting them "out of an abundance of caution." Defendant contends that the court had a sua sponte duty also to instruct in accordance with CALJIC No. 8.73 that if the evidence showed "provocation" that was insufficient to make the crime manslaughter, the jury might consider that provocation in deciding whether the crime was first or second degree murder. We need not decide whether the court must give such an instruction sua sponte when the evidence warrants (compare People v. Mayfield (1997) 14 Cal.4th 668, 778, with People v. Johnson (1993) 6 Cal.4th 1, 43, and People v. Perez (1992) 2 Cal.4th 1117, 1129), for here no evidence of provocation existed. (People v. Perez, supra, 2 Cal.4th at pp. 1129-1130.) "The fact that the prosecutor requested a heat of passion instruction for manslaughter does not establish that the evidence would have necessitated a sua sponte instruction. Such instructions are commonly requested out of an abundance of caution." (Id. at p. 1130.)
Defendant does not argue evidence existed that the victim provoked him into killing her. Rather, he argues that the word "provocation" is a "shorthand expression" for the statutory language defining voluntary manslaughter as a killing "upon a sudden quarrel or heat of passion." (§ 192, subd. (a).) He concedes there was no evidence of provocation in the sense of a quarrel, but he focuses on the phrase "heat of passion" and argues there was ample evidence he killed in the heat of passion. In
Page 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 California DUI Attorneys
DUI Lawyers
|
| |
to fill out a simple form to connect to DUI Lawyers in your area.
|
|