Supreme Court of California

A conviction and death sentence are affirmed on automatic appeal over claims of error regarding: 1) joinder; 2) exclusion of third party culpability evidence; 3) exclusion of an allegedly incriminating videotaped statement by a third party; 4) admission of evidence; 5) jury instruction; 6) a failure to give a unanimity instruction; 7) DNA evidence; 8) judicial misconduct; 9) denial of defense penalty phase instructions; 10) denial of an automatic motion to modify the verdict; 11) the constitutionality of the lying-in-wait special circumstance; 12) intercase proportionality; 13) constitutional challenges to the death penalty statute; 14) international law; and 15) the cumulative effect of errors.

Appellate Information

• Decided 07/02/2007
• Published 07/02/2007

Judges

• MORENO, J.

Court

• Supreme Court of California

Counsel

• For Appellees:
  
• Michael J. Hersek, State Public Defender, and Barry P. Helft, Chief Deputy State Public Defender, for Defendant and Appellant., Bill Lockyer and Edmund G. Brown, Jr., Attorneys General, Robert R. Anderson and Mary Jo Graves, Chief Assistant Attorneys General, Gary W. Schons, Assistant Attorney General, William M. Wood, Holly Wilkens and Andrew S. Mestman, Deputy Attorneys General, for Plaintiff and Respondent.