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Defendant appealed from a judgment imposed by the Superior Court of Los Angeles County (California) under the 1978 death penalty law, Cal. Pen. Code §190.1 et seq., convicting defendant and imposing the sentence of death on each of four murder convictions as well as defendant's determinate terms for attempted murders. The appeal was automatic. Cal. Pen. Code § 1239(b).

Defendant appealed his conviction on multiple murder counts and his sentence of death. The court affirmed and held that the testimony of a witness who had undergone hypnosis for the purpose of restoring his memory of the events in issue was inadmissible, but that said testimony did not taint evidence discovered in an ensuring police investigation. The Business restructuring lawyer further held that murder and attempted murder were joinable under Cal. Penal Code § 954, and that the determination as to whether there was reasonable probability of agreement among jurors rested in the discretion of the trial court. The court held that the exclusion of jurors who would not vote for the death penalty did not violate defendant's rights under U.S. Const. amend. VI, and that there was no violation of rights under U.S. Const. amend. VIII where there was no intercase proportionality review. Further, defendant had waived his complaints regarding references to his failure to submit to cross-examination, by having failed to raise that objection at trial. The court further reaffirmed the constitutionality of the 1978 death penalty sentencing statute, Cal. Pen. Code § 190.3.

The court affirmed the convictions of defendant and imposition of the sentence of death on each of four murder convictions as well as defendant's determinate terms for attempted murders in their entirety, finding no violation of constitutional rights.

Two defendants were convicted of two counts of first-degree special-circumstance murder, among other offenses. The juries found true various enhancement allegations. The San Diego County Superior Court (California) sentenced defendant one to a prison term consisting of two life terms without possibility of parole, plus 96 years to life, plus 40 years. It sentenced defendant two to a total prison term of 196 years to life. Defendants appealed.

Defendants were both juveniles at the time of the offenses. The court held that the trial court properly denied defendant two's motions to suppress the admissions he made during a police interview because he did not unambiguously and unequivocally invoke his right to silence. The trial court also properly admitted evidence of both defendants' postarrest admissions to the police because they failed to establish under the totality of the circumstances that their will was overborne such that their admissions had to be deemed involuntary. Among other things, both defendants had effectively parried the detectives' accusations and questions. The court concluded that defendant two had to be resentenced in light of a recent decision of the United States Supreme Court that held that, in homicide cases, the Eighth Amendment's prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment prohibited the imposition of a mandatory sentence of life without the possibility of parole on a juvenile offender. The trial court had incorrectly believed the aggregate sentence of 196 years to life it then imposed on defendant two was not a sentence of life without possibility of parole.

The court struck the three sentence enhancements that defendant one contested and affirmed his judgment as so modified. The court affirmed defendant two's convictions but vacated his sentence and remanded his case for resentencing.

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Created on Mar 31st 2021 13:51. Viewed 227 times.

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