In what circumstances will a defendant be found not guilty of a charge under duress under the duress defense?

In Otis, the defendant, a prison inmate, claimed that a fellow inmate threatened him with violence "'at some future date'" if he did not conceal knives for him. (Otis, supra, 174 Cal.App.2d at p. 122.) At issue was whether the trial court properly instructed the jury the defendant could be acquitted if he believed "'that his life would be then and there endangered if he refused'" to comply with the fellow inmate. (Id. at p. 123.) The instruction proposed by the defendant did not include the requirement that the danger be "immediate or imminent." (Ibid.) The court reasoned that the cases upholding the duress defense all involved the situation of "a present and active aggressor threatening immediate danger." (Id. at p. 125.) Because the defendant's proposed instruction "failed to incorporate the element of immediacy of danger," the court held that the trial court did not err in declining to give the proposed instruction. (Id. at p. 126.) Thus, contrary to appellant's argument, Otis did hold that the duress defense has an immediacy requirement. (See, e.g., People v. Sanders (1927) 82 Cal.App. 778, 785 [upholding instruction stating that "[t]he danger must not be one of future violence, but of present and immediate violence at the time of the commission of the forbidden act."]; People v. Martin (1910) 13 Cal.App.

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