There was sufficient evidence that defendant proximately caused the victim’s death where the victim’s family decided to withdraw his life support, as the decision was a dependent, not independent, intervening cause of the victim’s death. Defendant fractured the victim’s skull with a stick. Based on defendant’s actions, “it is reasonable to contemplate a scenario where medical treatment might prevent death but is nonetheless undesirable because the victim could not be restored to a quality of life she or he would tolerate as acceptable.” Accordingly, the jury could reasonably infer that the decision to withdraw the victim’s life support was foreseeable and was therefore not an independent intervening cause. And second, removing life support for the victim caused a type of harm that could reasonably be expected from defendant’s conduct. Whether or not the decisions of the victim’s family were themselves foreseeable, “the death of the victim due to beating was.”

The trial court did not err in refusing to give the defendant’s requested pinpoint instruction defining an independent intervening cause. Although defendant’s requested instruction referred to an “independent intervening cause” and that phrase was absent from the given instructions, the court still properly explained to the jury that if something unusual intervened, it would negate proximate causation. Additionally, the instructions defendant requested were potentially confusing and incomplete.

The full opinion is available on the court’s website here: https://www.courts.ca.gov/opinions/documents/D081131.PDF