Bobo

In the published portion of the opinion, we address the impact of the 1981 changes to the Penal Code, sections 28, 29, 188, and 189, that abolished the defense of diminished capacity and refined the concepts of “express malice” and “deliberate and premeditated.”

The unpublished portion of the opinion illustrates the distinction between the medical diagnosis of a serious mental disease and the legal definition of insanity.

A jury found defendant guilty of arson and three counts of first degree murder. (Pen. Code, §§ 451, subd. (b), 187; all further undesignated section references are to the Penal Code.) The jury found the alleged special circumstance of multiple murders to be true (§ 190.2, subd. (a)(3)) and that defendant used a deadly weapon (a knife) to commit the killings (§ 12022, subd. (b)). This same jury found defendant sane during the commission of the crimes.

The prosecution did not seek the death penalty. Sentenced to three consecutive life terms without the possibility of parole, defendant appeals asserting (1) the evidence is insufficient to support the convictions and sanity findings, (2) the prosecutor committed misconduct, and (3) the trial court erred…