Garcia

A Los Angeles jury found defendant Randy Eugene Garcia guilty of crimes stemming from two home invasions committed the night before Mother’s Day, 1993, in the same neighborhood in Torrance. The most serious incident, in which the victims—a married couple with children—were home during the burglary, resulted in convictions for the first degree murder of Joseph Finzel (Pen. Code, § 187, subd. (a)), 1 and the attempted premeditated murder of his wife, L. (§§ 187, subd. (a), 664.) Related convictions involved burglary (§ 459), robbery (§ 211), attempted forcible rape (§§ 261, subd. (a)(2), 664), and forcible oral copulation (§ 288a, subd. (c)). The jury also sustained special circumstances providing that the Finzel murder occurred in the commission of burglary, robbery, attempted rape, and oral copulation. (§ 190.2, subd. (a)(17).) Additional findings were that defendant was armed with and personally used a handgun (§§ 12022, subd. (a)(1), 12022.5, subd. (a)), and that he personally inflicted great bodily injury on L. (§ 12022.7). In the other incident charged in this case, defendant was convicted of burglarizing the home of a second couple, the Kozaks, who were vacationing…

I join in affirming defendant’s judgment of death. I write separately because, although I agree with the majority that defendant’s challenge to the grand jury selection process lacks merit, I reach that conclusion by using a somewhat different analysis.

In June 1993, the Grand Jury of Los Angeles County returned an indictment charging defendant with, among other things, the murder of Joseph Finzel. Thereafter, defendant moved in superior court to dismiss the indictment, alleging that the process used to select the grand jurors discriminated against women and Hispanics in violation of the equal protection guarantee of the federal Constitution’s Fourteenth Amendment. The trial court held a hearing at which both the prosecution and defendant submitted evidence, after which the court denied the motion. On this appeal, defendant argues that the trial court erred in so ruling.

Although the prosecutor argued in the trial court that defendant’s equal protection claim is controlled by the United States Supreme Court’s decision in Duren v. Missouri (1979) 439 U.S. 357 [ 58 L.Ed.2d 579 , 99 S.Ct. 664 ], in this court the Attorney General has conceded that the controlling authority is the…

A Los Angeles jury found defendant Randy Eugene Garcia guilty of crimes stemming from two home invasions committed the night before Mother's Day, 1993, in the same neighborhood in Torrance. The most serious incident, in which the victims—a married couple with children—were home during the burglary, resulted in convictions for the first degree murder of Joseph Finzel (Pen. Code, § 187, subd. (a)), [1] and the attempted premeditated murder of his wife, L. (§§ 187, subd. (a), 664.) Related convictions involved burglary (§ 459), robbery (§ 211), attempted forcible rape (§§ 261, subd. (a)(2), 664), and forcible oral copulation (§ 288a, subd. (c)). The jury also sustained special circumstances providing that the Finzel murder occurred in the commission of burglary, robbery, attempted rape, and oral copulation. (§ 190.2, subd. (a)(17).) Additional findings were that defendant was armed with and personally used a handgun (§§ 12022, subd. (a)(1), 12022.5, subd. (a)), and that he personally inflicted great bodily injury on L. (§ 12022.7). In the other incident charged in this case, defendant was convicted of burglarizing the home of a second couple, the Kozaks, who were…