Blair

A jury convicted defendant James Nelson Blair of the first degree murder of Dorothy Green (Pen. Code, § 187) and found true the special circumstance allegation of murder by the administration of poison. (§ 190.2, subd. (a)(19).) At the penalty phase of the trial, the jury returned a verdict of death. The trial court denied defendant’s automatic motion to modify the verdict (§ 190.4, subd. (e)) and imposed a death sentence.

This appeal is automatic. (§ 1239, subd. (b).) We affirm the judgment in its entirety.

I. Factual Background

Defendant was convicted of the first degree murder of his neighbor Dorothy Green by the administration of poison. The prosecution’s evidence showed that, in 1984, defendant deliberately poisoned Green and Green’s friend, Rhoda Miller, by placing cyanide in a gin bottle and giving the bottle to Miller to deliver to Green. The apparent motive was to obtain money that defendant believed was owed to him by Green. Green drank more of the gin than Miller, fell into a coma that lasted for several months, and sustained brain damage. Green survived for almost two years and then died from pneumonia in 1986. Medical experts testified that the cyanide…