People v. Gonzales

• Decision Date: 18 March 2013
• Docket Number: No. S191240.,S191240.
• Court: California Supreme Court
• Parties: The PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. Ramiro GONZALES, Defendant and Appellant.

56 Cal.4th 353

296 P.3d 945

154 Cal.Rptr.3d 38

The PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Respondent,

v.Ramiro GONZALES, Defendant and Appellant.

No. S191240.

Supreme Court of California

March 18, 2013.

See 2 Witkin, Cal. Evidence (5th ed. 2012) Witnesses, § 216 et seq.

Jean Matulis, under appointment by the Supreme Court, for Defendant and Appellant.

Ron Boyer for California Attorneys for Criminal Justice as Amicus Curiae on behalf of Defendant and Appellant.

Edmund G. Brown, Jr., and Kamala D. Harris, Attorneys General, Dane R. Gillette, Chief Assistant Attorney General, Gerald A. Engler, Assistant Attorney General, Gregg Zwyicke, Seth K. Schalit and Bridgit Billeter, Deputy Attorneys General, for Plaintiff and Respondent.

CANTIL–SAKAUYE, C.J.

We granted review in this case to determine whether the trial court properly applied the psychotherapist-patient privilege with regard to statements made by a parolee to his therapist during parole-mandated therapy sessions and, if not, whether the trial court's error constitutes a violation of a federal constitutional right of privacy as well as a violation of the state statutory privilege.

In January 2007, the Santa Clara County District Attorney filed a petition seeking to commit defendant Ramiro Gonzales as a sexually violent predator (SVP) under the Sexually Violent Predator Act (SVPA) (Welf. & Inst.Code, § 6600 et seq.). Prior to the commencement of trial in the SVPA proceeding in 2008, the district attorney sought to obtain access to psychological records of defendant that had been compiled during outpatient psychological evaluation and counseling sessions in which defendant had participated as a condition of parole. Defendant opposed such disclosure as a violation of California's statutory psychotherapist-patient privilege. (Evid.Code, § 1010 et seq.) The trial court concluded that disclosure of such records to the prosecution and its expert witnesses in an SVPA proceeding was permissible under the dangerous patient exception to the psychotherapist-patient privilege (Evid.Code, § 1024) and ordered the requested disclosure. Thereafter, just prior to trial, the trial court further determined, again on the basis of the dangerous patient exception, that the therapist who had provided one-on-one counseling to defendant during the counseling sessions would be permitted to testify at the SVPA trial regarding statements made by defendant to the therapist during those counseling sessions. At the conclusion of trial, the jury found that defendant was an SVP within the meaning of the SVPA and the trial court committed defendant to the custody of the State Department of Mental Health (now State Department of State Hospitals) for an indefinite term.

On appeal, the Court of Appeal reversed. The Court of Appeal first concluded that the trial court erred in ordering disclosure of defendant's psychological records and permitting defendant's former therapist to testify to statements made by defendant during his counseling sessions. The Court of Appeal then determined that the trial court's error constituted not only state law error but also a violation of defendant's federal constitutional right of privacy. Because the Court of Appeal was of the view that the trial court's action constituted federal constitutional error, it held that the question whether the admission of the challenged evidence was prejudicial must properly be evaluated under the stringent beyond a reasonable doubt prejudicial error standard generally applicable to federal constitutional error under Chapman v. California (1967) 386 U.S. 18, 87 S.Ct. 824, 17 L.Ed.2d 705 and its progeny. Applying that strict prejudicial error standard, the Court of Appeal held that the trial court error required reversal of the order of commitment.

The People sought review in this court, contending that the Court of Appeal was mistaken both in finding that the trial court erred in ordering disclosure of the psychological records and admitting the former therapist's testimony, and further in concluding that the asserted error violated the federal Constitution. We granted review to address both issues.

For the reasons discussed hereafter, we agree with the Court of Appeal's conclusion that the trial court erred in permitting disclosure of defendant's psychological records and in admitting his former therapist's testimony in reliance upon the dangerous patient exception to the psychotherapist-patient privilege. We disagree, however, with the Court of Appeal's determination that the trial court error in this regard constitutes an error of federal constitutional dimension, and thus we conclude that the prejudicial nature of the error must properly be evaluated under the usual prejudicial error standard applicable to state law error set forth in People v. Watson (1956) 46 Cal.2d 818, 836, 299 P.2d 243, namely, whether it is reasonably probable that the error affected the result. Applying that standard, we conclude that the trial court error was not prejudicial and does not require reversal of the trial court judgment.

I. Summary of Facts and Proceedings BelowA. Defendant's Background and Events Preceding His 2004 Parole

Defendant was born on February 18, 1955, and was 53 years old at the time of the 2008 trial of the SVPA proceeding at issue in this case. At age seven, defendant contracted spinal meningitis, which caused him to suffer significant intellectual and developmental disabilities, and thereafter he attended special education classes and needed help with daily living chores. (In psychological testing conducted many years later, defendant was determined to have a full IQ score of between 65 and 71.) He ultimately dropped out of high school, continued to live at home with his mother, received Social Security benefits as a result of his disability, and earned some money collecting cans for recycling and doing simple yard work.

In April 1975, at age 20, defendant was convicted of his first sex offense. As described in the probation report, defendant, while mowing the lawn at a home where a five-year-old girl lived, was seen hugging the girl and when he let her go he was observed with an erection. The girl reported that while defendant was hugging her he whispered obscenities in her ear. As a result of that incident, defendant was convicted of misdemeanor annoying or molesting a child. (Pen.Code, § 647.6.)

Two years later, in April 1977, defendant again committed a somewhat similar offense with another young girl. In that incident, after defendant had finished mowing the lawn of a home where a seven-year-old girl lived, the girl's mother invited defendant into the house in order to obtain defendant's phone number so she could pay him at a later date. Once inside, defendant asked to use the telephone and then pretended to make a phone call, making the girl's mother suspicious. The mother telephoned her brother and asked him to come to her house and then went outside to wait for her brother to arrive. When the mother reentered her house, she found defendant on the couch with her seven-year-old daughter, touching the girl's buttocks and crotch area over her clothing. When asked to explain his conduct, defendant said that it “looked easy,” that he did not know how to “do sex” with women, and that he had “got hot” after the mother had left the house. As a result of that incident, defendant was convicted of lewd and lascivious conduct with a minor (Pen.Code, § 288, subd. (a)) and was placed on probation with conditions including confinement in county jail, and registration as a sex offender pursuant to Penal Code section 290.

Seventeen years later, in August 1994, when defendant was 39 years old, defendant was convicted of another sex offense with a young girl. On that occasion, defendant was at his sister's house for a celebration of a child's baptism. During the party, a friend of defendant's sister put her four-year-old daughter to sleep in one of the bedrooms. Defendant was later found in the bedroom rubbing the young girl's vaginal area over her underpants while she slept; upon his arrest, defendant attributed his behavior to his being very drunk. As a result of that conduct, defendant was again convicted of lewd and lascivious conduct with a minor (Pen.Code, § 288, subd. (a)), and this time was sentenced to a determinate term of 11 years in prison.

Prior to defendant's scheduled release from prison on parole in the spring of 2004, the Santa Clara County District Attorney filed a petition seeking to have defendant civilly committed under the SVPA. After a trial, however, a jury unanimously found not true the allegation that defendant was an SVP within the meaning of the SVPA, and as a result defendant was not subjected to an SVPA commitment at that time.

B. Defendant's 2004 Parole Conditions and Conduct on Parole

On May 28, 2004, defendant was released on parole under conditions that barred his use of alcohol, contact with sex offenders, contact with minors, and being within 100 feet of places where children congregate, including parks and schools. Because his mother's residence was too close to a school, defendant was not permitted to live at his mother's house, but he was allowed to visit her there. Most significantly for the issue presented in this case, as an additional condition of parole defendant was required to attend outpatient psychological evaluation and treatment as directed by his parole agent.

In January 2006, defendant's parole agent took defendant to the Atkinson Assessment Center (Atkinson Center) for outpatient treatment and counseling pursuant to defendant's parole condition. At the Atkinson Center, Pat Potter McAndrews, a certified psychologist, was defendant's psychotherapist; Dr. Carol Atkinson, the head of the Atkinson Center, was McAndrews' supervisor. As we shall see, a principal issue presented by this case is whether statements made by defendant to McAndrews as part of the evaluation, treatment and...