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People v. Kraft8/10/2000
fficient. [Citation.]" (People v. Diaz (1992) 3 Cal.4th 495, 528-529.) The identity of the perpetrator is not an element of the corpus delicti. (People v. Cobb (1955) 45 Cal.2d 158, 161.) That Loggins's naked body was found beside a road in a trash bag with a rope around his ankles and wrists supplies at least a prima facie showing of criminal agency, inasmuch as the bodies of victims of accidental drug overdose typically would not be disposed of in such a fashion. The inference of criminal agency in connection with the death is therefore reasonable and supports admission into evidence of the list entry assertedly pertaining to Loggins.
The evidence as a whole, moreover, sufficed to prove defendant murdered Loggins, under the standard applied in connection with defendant's challenge to the sufficiency of the evidence to support eight of the other murder convictions. In addition to the evidence recited above, photographs of Loggins were found in defendant's car and in a briefcase located in defendant's house. In some of the photographs Loggins was partially clothed or naked, and one photograph depicted Loggins holding his penis. According to Loggins's father, however, Loggins was not homosexual (and thus, one could infer, would not voluntarily have posed for defendant). Loggins, who had various tattoos, was a Marine and was last seen alive by some fellow Marines at the Huntington Beach pier; the prosecutor plausibly argued the entry "MC HB TATTOO" on defendant's list referred to Loggins. The jury could properly find defendant guilty of the first degree murder of Wyatt Loggins.
3. Sufficiency of Evidence of Mayhem-Geoffrey Nelson
Defendant argues his conviction of mayhem must be reversed because the crime of mayhem requires a live victim (see People v. Jentry (1977) 69 Cal.App.3d 615, 629) and the record lacks any evidence Nelson was alive when he was emasculated. We disagree with defendant's characterization of the record. Officer Donald Batchelder of the Los Angeles Police Department testified that, shortly after he discovered Nelson's body on the Euclid on-ramp to the Garden Grove Freeway while driving to work at 5:15 a.m. on February 12, 1983, he saw Nelson's foot move. Nelson's body was warm to the touch, although a responding Garden Grove police officer detected no pulse or respiration. Pathologist Robert Richards, reviewing the autopsy report of Dr. Fischer (who was deceased at the time of trial), which noted the bleeding caused by the severing of Nelson's penis and scrotum was "not that great," opined the emasculation "probably" occurred post-mortem, although it might have happened "perimortem," or around the time of death.
Although the bleeding, in Dr. Richards's opinion, was "not that great" and "there sn't too much in the way of tissue response to the cutting," evidently there was some bleeding and some tissue response, lending support to Dr. Richards's testimony the emasculation could have occurred perimortem. The jury could reasonably find the elements of mayhem were present here. That a contrary conclusion might also be reasonable does not compel reversal of the conviction. (People v. Thomas, supra, 2 Cal.4th at p. 514.) Even were we to reverse the mayhem conviction, however, there could be no conceivable effect on the judgment, in light of the 16 murders of which defendant was convicted and the eight additional murders, evidence of which was presented during the penalty phase.
4. Sufficiency of Evidence to Support Sodomy Verdict and Special Circumstance Finding
Defendant contends the record contains insufficient evidence to support his conviction of sodomy and the related special circumstance pertaining to victim Inderbieten, in
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