Brown

Appellant appeals from a judgment of conviction entered on a jury’s verdict. She was convicted of murder in violation of Penal Code section 187 (count I) and conspiracy to commit murder in violation of Penal Code section 182 (count II). Appellant contends (1) that the evidence was insufficient to justify her conviction on either count, (2) that hearsay testimony was improperly admitted into evidence, and (3) that she was denied a fair trial because several prospective jurors who voiced opposition to the death penalty were automatically excluded by the trial judge.

P. J. Brown was killed by his eldest daughter, Terry Min-son, on November 5, 1966, at approximately 12:30 a.m. while he was asleep in the den of his home in Selma, California. The background facts of this bizarre murder, when viewed in the light most favorable to respondent, are essentially these:

In the spring of 1966 appellant offered Clyde Rhodes, a friend of Terry Minson, $2,000 to kill her husband. Rhodes told appellant he would not do it. In the summer of that year appellant made the same offer to her daughter’s boy friend, Mike Vance. Vance said he was not interested. A few days later appellant, in the presence…