The People, Plaintiff and Respondent v. Royal Clark, Defendant an — Kennard, J., Concurring in Part and Dissenting…

Summary

Justice Kennard concurred in affirming the judgment of death but disagreed with the majority's analysis of two claims. She would reject the racial-bias challenge because the prosecutor gave genuine race-neutral reasons for the peremptory strikes, while concluding that the evidence was insufficient for the witness-killing special-circumstance finding; she nevertheless found no prejudice because two other special circumstances supported death eligibility and the underlying evidence remained admissible as circumstances of the crime. Justice Werdegar, concurring in part and dissenting in part, joined Kennard's reasoning concerning the invalid witness-killing special circumstance but otherwise joined the majority.