What is the test for reducing a charge of murder from murder to voluntary manslaughter?

Defendant contends the judgment must be reversed because the trial court erroneously concluded that, as a matter of law, "there was not and could not be adequate provocation in a case such as this" to reduce the charges from murder to voluntary manslaughter. He challenges the court's verdict that he was guilty of murder on two bases. First, he argues that the court improperly concluded that defendant's passive victims could not have provoked him. Defendant asserts this was error because "[t]here is no requirement that the victim do anything, let alone anything wrong, other than provoke the defendant," and here the victims provoked him "by becoming ill, by suffering, and by not improving notwithstanding appellant's persistent efforts." Second, defendant argues that the court "confused the present claim of voluntary manslaughter with mercy killing," which is not a defense to a charge of murder. (See People v. Cleaves (1991) 229 Cal.App.3d 367, 375-376.) In defendant's view, the court thus failed to "consider the possibility that such a killing could be the product of an emotional response so intense that the reason of the actor was obscured so as to negate the element of 'malice' required to prove a murder charge; and reduce a charge of murder to manslaughter."

These arguments are not persuasive. The trial court allowed defendant to present a voluntary manslaughter

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