Can a prosecutor be held liable for improper questioning of witnesses?

Defendant contends the trial court abused its discretion when it denied his mistrial motion after the prosecutor elicited inadmissible evidence regarding witnesses invoking their Fifth Amendment rights. While it is misconduct for a prosecutor to elicit inadmissible testimony, "a prosecutor cannot be faulted for a witness's nonresponsive answer that the prosecutor neither solicited nor could have anticipated." (People v. Tully (2012) 54 Cal.4th 952, 1035, 145 Cal.Rptr.3d 146, 282 P.3d 173.) Whether or not the prosecutor's questions elicited defendant's testimony that witnesses had asserted the self-incrimination privilege, the court sustained the defense's

[62 Cal.4th 999]

objection to that testimony and admonished the jury to disregard it. The revelation that unidentified witnesses had "pled the fifth" was not so necessarily prejudicial that we should set aside the normal presumption that the jury followed the court's admonition. (People v. Thornton (2007) 41 Cal.4th 391, 441, 61 Cal.Rptr.3d 461, 161 P.3d 3.) Thus, even if the prosecutor's questions were improper, defendant was not prejudiced. Under these circumstances, the court did not abuse its discretion in denying the mistrial motion.