People v. Rodriguez

• Decision Date: 23 October 1986
• Citation: 726 P.2d 113,230 Cal.Rptr. 667,42 Cal.3d 730
• Court: California Supreme Court
• Parties: , 726 P.2d 113, 55 USLW 2298 The PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. Luis Valenzuela RODRIGUEZ, Defendant and Appellant. Crim. 22090.

Page 667

230 Cal.Rptr. 667

42 Cal.3d 730, 726 P.2d 113, 55 USLW 2298

The PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. Luis Valenzuela RODRIGUEZ, Defendant and Appellant.

Crim. 22090.

Supreme Court of California,

In Bank.

Oct. 23, 1986.

As Modified on Denial of Rehearing Dec. 31, 1986.

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[726 P.2d 118] [42 Cal.3d 741] Dennis P. Riordan, under appointment by the Supreme Court for defendant and appellant.

[42 Cal.3d 742] John K. Van de Kamp, Atty. Gen., Ann K. Jensen, Linda Ludlow, Ronald S. Matthias and Nathan D. Mihara, Deputy Attys. Gen., for plaintiff and respondent.

GRODIN, Justice.

Luis Valenzuela Rodriguez appeals from a judgment of death imposed for the first degree murders of California Highway Patrol Officers William H. Freeman and Roy Paul Blecher on December 22, 1978. The jury found that appellant had personally

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used a firearm in both murders (Pen.Code, [726 P.2d 119] § 12022.5) ¹ and, as special circumstances justifying the death penalty, that he was convicted of more than one murder ( § 190.2, subd. (a)(3)) and that both victims were peace officers intentionally killed while in the performance of their duties ( § 190.2, subd. (a)(7)). The crimes were committed in Yolo County, but pursuant to appellant's motion for change of venue, the case was transferred to San Mateo County for trial

We find no prejudicial error in the guilt phase of appellant's trial and will therefore affirm the convictions, as well as the allegations and special circumstances found true by the jury. Similarly, we will reject all but one of appellant's challenges to the penalty phase, including his several attacks on the constitutionality of the 1978 death penalty law. We will conclude, however, that in deciding the automatic application for modification of the death verdict ( § 190.4, subd. (e)), the trial judge failed to make an independent determination whether the death penalty was proper under the law and evidence, as the statute requires. We will therefore vacate the penalty judgment and remand to the trial court solely for a reconsideration of the modification application under the principles set forth in this opinion.

I. GUILT PHASE

A. Evidence of Guilt

About 3:40 a.m. on December 22, 1978, two witnesses situated near the crossing of Harbor Boulevard over Interstate 80 in West Sacramento heard gunshots and saw red and other lights on the freeway. One of the witnesses, a deputy sheriff, drove onto the freeway to investigate. He discovered a California Highway Patrol cruiser parked by itself on the eastbound shoulder. The vehicle's forward red light, right blinkers, and right spotlight [42 Cal.3d 743] were illuminated, but the headlights were off. The right front door was open. The lifeless bodies of Officers Freeman and Blecher were lying to the right of the car.

The principal witness against appellant was Margaret Klaess, who testified that appellant was the driver and she the sole passenger in a stolen car when it was stopped by the highway patrol at the time and place of the crimes. She stated that she saw appellant get out of the car, heard shots, and later was told by appellant about his struggling with the officers, handcuffing one of them, and shooting him in the head.

Klaess met appellant in January 1978 and lived with him intermittently throughout that year. About the end of November they moved into the Bel Air Motel in West Sacramento. Shortly therafter they were arrested by the Richmond police, who impounded appellant's panel truck.

On December 20 they began hitchhiking from West Sacramento to Richmond in order to redeem the truck, planning to obtain the $70 for impoundment charges through robbery. At Davis they were picked up by the owner of a new Jeep pickup truck. Appellant displayed a gun and, at Vallejo, forced the host driver to hand over his wallet and get out, whereupon they drove to Richmond and abandoned the truck.

Next day a friend drove them from Richmond to Vallejo, where appellant obtained a temporary driver's license under a false name. Klaess and appellant then went to two used-car lots where they absconded with used cars under the pretext of test driving them. They left the first car, a Volkswagen Beetle, at the second lot, where they obtained a 1977 dark brown Camaro. They drove it to San Francisco, where appellant went to the front door of a house and robbed the occupant of money at gunpoint. From San Francisco they drove to Sausalito and offered a ride to a woman prostitute, who got in the car. In an industrial area of San Rafael they came to a stop; appellant pulled out a gun and forced the woman to surrender money and jewelry; and Klaess rifled the woman's purse.

After buying a pint of 151 proof rum, the pair drove to the house of their friend in

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Richmond, and then to the home of a second[726 P.2d 120] friend, Jeri Engel, in Crockett. Engel testified that Klaess was drunk when she arrived. After a while Engel and appellant went to a local bar where they purchased cocaine. Returning to Engel's house, they shared the cocaine with Klaess and with Engel's boyfriend

Klaess and appellant then left Crockett for West Sacramento. The time of their departure is sharply disputed; Engel testified it was 2:30 a.m. [42 Cal.3d 744] Klaess slept until they had passed Vallejo. Appellant was driving faster than most of the traffic on the foggy freeway. As they neared Sacramento, appellant said, "Oh, shit, we're getting red lighted," and pulled over to the shoulder. An officer appeared at the driver's window and asked appellant to step outside; he complied. Klaess heard voices at the rear of the Camaro and then, about two minutes after appellant's exit, a shot from the right rear. She looked out the passenger window and saw an officer lying in the ice plant, about 20 feet from the Camaro and about even with its front wheels, calling for help. Klaess slumped down in the seat below the window. Appellant reappeared at the driver's side, acting nervous, and said that he could not find "the license." Immediately, he left again and Klaess heard a shot, followed by a series of shots. Appellant reappeared in half a minute and said in a panicky voice that he could not find the license or "the gun." He left a third time and returned in 20 or 30 seconds with two silver revolvers, which were put in Klaess's purse.

Appellant then drove the Camaro off the freeway and parked near some apartments. They wiped off fingerprints, then proceeded on foot to the Bel Air Motel, sliding down a muddy embankment. On the way, they disposed of the two silver revolvers in a dumpster.

Appellant's "Lee" brand pants, found at his motel room on December 24, were wet and muddy and had human blood on the left rear upper leg. According to Klaess, appellant was wearing "Lee" brand pants when they left Crockett.

Immediately after discovery of the crimes, investigators found appellant's temporary driver's license on the ground near the highway patrol car. Also on the ground was a footprint of the heel and sole pattern of the brand of shoe (Famolare) worn by appellant at the time of his arrest on December 24. Several witnesses who were at the scene denied having worn that brand of shoe.

The victims had each carried a .38 revolver issued by the highway patrol. Neither gun was ever found, but the bullets found at the scene appeared to have been fired by them. Bullets fired into Freeman's elbow, torso and head came from one of those guns; bullets fired into Freeman's left shoulder and into the head of Blecher (who was handcuffed) came from the other.

Two weapons were lying on the ground. One was an empty .38 revolver that Blecher carried as a backup weapon, and the other was a .22 revolver, introduced as exhibit 6. Klaess testified that she had seen exhibit 6 in appellant's possession at the Bel Air Motel and that he carried a gun on [42 Cal.3d 745] his person throughout the three robberies and the visit to Engel's home immediately preceding the killings. Of the three robbery victims, one said that the gun used was shinier than exhibit 6 but otherwise similar; another said that the gun used was similar in color only shinier; a third said the gun used was similar but with a slightly larger barrel. Yet none of these witnesses testified that exhibit 6 was not the gun used by appellant.

Several witnesses, including friends with whom appellant had socialized earlier in 1978, testified to hearing him repeatedly express hatred of police and threaten to kill any police who would attempt to arrest him. A woman with whom appellant had a romantic relationship in the fall of 1978 (while he was estranged from Klaess) testified that on several occasions he declared he did not like police and that if faced with arrest by police officers he would "blow them away." She further testified that in mid-November a Sacramento police officer stopped her car, which was being driven by

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[726 P.2d 121] appellant with her as a passenger. As the officer approached and appellant was slowing to a stop, he muttered an obscenity, said, "We're going to get busted," and reached for a sawed-off shotgun that was in the back seat. She pushed his hand away, covered the gun with her coat, and told him he was "crazy." During the traffic stop, she asked random questions to distract the officer from appellant's anger. After the officer left, she remonstrated that "getting a ticket is no big thing" and is not a reason to reach for a gun. Appellant tore up the ticket and said, "I don't want to get busted."

In addition to Klaess's testimony of appellant's admissions of participation in the murders, there was evidence that on December 23 appellant told a friend that he had "downed a couple of them [policemen]" and told a business partner, who mentioned burglar alarm problems, that he (appellant) had done something so "heavy" that the burglar alarm problems would seem like nothing. (Though the friend denied the incident while testifying,...