California (11.2.2004)

The Supreme Court of California released two opinions yesterday (sorry this post is a bit late):

1. In People v. Turner, S009038B, the court affirmed Richard Dean Turner’s sentence of death for two murders committed during a 1979 burglary. This is the second time the California Supreme Court has seen this case; in 1984, the court reversed Turner’s original judgment of death because the trial court failed to instruct on intent to kill as an element of the felony-murder and multiple-murder special circumstances. On retrial, a jury convicted the defendant again, and this appeal was automatic. The court rejected Turner’s allegations of various errors. While the court declined to address the constitutionality of the death penalty, leaving “decisions regarding the propriety of the death penalty to the Legislature and the People of the State of California,” the court catalogued cases upholding the death penalty’s constitutionality.

2. The California Tort Claims Act requires employees who wish to sue their public employer to notify the agency in writing first, thus helping the government to “adequately investigate claims and to settle them, if appropriate, without the expense of litigation.” In Stockett v. Assn. of California Water Agencies, S108220, the court held that this written claim need not detail every theory the plaintiff might raise at trial as long as it specifies each cause of action—in this case, wrongful termination. The court upheld a jury verdict of $4.5 million for the wrongfully terminated employee.