District Attorney Hochman Backs Legal Challenge Against Governor’s Blanket Commutation of 548 Death Row Sentences

LOS ANGELES — Los Angeles County District Attorney Nathan J. Hochman today announced his office’s full support for the Criminal Justice Legal Foundation (CJLF) in its legal challenge opposing Governor Gavin Newsom’s blanket commutation of all 548 California death row sentences to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole.

District Attorney Hochman emphasized that while the California Constitution grants the governor clemency authority, approximately 382 of these 548 cases involving individuals convicted of more than one felony cannot be commuted without majority approval from the California Supreme Court. Representing roughly 30 to 40 percent of the state’s criminal caseload, Los Angeles County accounts for more than 150 of the condemned inmates affected by the Governor’s mass commutation, including notorious serial killers Chester Turner, the “Southside Slayer,” convicted of 14 murders, and Michael Gargiulo, the “Hollywood Ripper,” convicted of two murders and an attempted third.

“We stand firmly with the Criminal Justice Legal Foundation in challenging this arbitrary commutation that sidelines victims’ families and disregards the will of California voters, juries and judges,” District Attorney Hochman said. “When we bring these cases on behalf of victims’ families, we make a promise to them that if they let the justice system do its job and don’t take justice into their own hands, we will let the facts and the law play out in a courtroom. And if the facts and the law justify the ultimate penalty, that is the penalty we will seek.”

After being in power for over seven years and already putting a moratorium on execution of the death penalty in place, “The Governor woke up with roughly 60 days left in his term, made a blanket decision without contacting victims, victim families or justice stakeholders and proclaimed that everyone on death row no longer would face the death penalty. Rather than doing the hard work of analyzing each case individually and showing respect to the thousands of victim family members, the thousands of jurors who returned these death verdicts after listening to the evidence of the case, and the hundreds of judges who affirmed these verdicts, the Governor chose to act unilaterally and capriciously, substituting his blanket judgment for the considered judgment of the key stakeholders.

“Blanket commutations represent an abdication of the Governor’s responsibility to evaluate each case on its merits. Each one of these cases leaves behind a victim’s family that went through agonizing proceedings for years or decades, reliving the tragedies that befell their loved ones over and over until they finally thought they had achieved some level of closure and finality — only to have it violently disrupted,” District Attorney Hochman stated.

District Attorney Hochman contrasted the Governor’s wholesale action with the rigorous, individualized review process practiced by the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office. Over his roughly 20 months in office, District Attorney Hochman has personally reviewed more than 50 death-penalty-eligible cases, thoroughly examining the specific facts and applicable law while directly engaging with victims’ families to hear their input before making a determination. To date, after rigorous examinations, the death penalty has not been applied in any of these cases.

Historically, governors exercising clemency have conducted similar individualized reviews and consulted with surviving family members. The Governor’s decision bypasses that review process entirely and undercuts years of painstaking work by police and prosecutors. These sentences were secured only after proving guilt beyond a reasonable doubt in separate trial and penalty phases, and surviving decades of state and federal appeals.

District Attorney Hochman also challenged the Governor’s assertion that commuting these sentences to life without the possibility of parole ensures offenders will die a natural death in prison, pointing to the 1996 convictions of Erik and Lyle Menendez as a cautionary precedent.

“Contrary to the Governor’s assertion, life without the possibility of parole no longer guarantees that you will spend your life in prison,” District Attorney Hochman noted. “When Erik and Lyle Menendez were sentenced in 1996, a jury gave them life without the possibility of parole, and for 30 years that sentence was in place, until the State Legislature changed the rules, giving them the possibility of parole. While the Legislature cannot touch a death sentence to create parole eligibility, it can change the rules at any moment for life-without-parole sentences. The Governor cannot tell victims’ families with any degree of certainty that these murderers will spend the rest of their natural lives behind bars.”

District Attorney Hochman further pointed out that California voters twice rejected ballot measures to repeal the death penalty over the last 15 years, voting in both 2012 and 2016 to keep capital punishment on the books. Rather than asking the State Legislature to pass a repeal bill and submit it to the voters as a ballot proposition, or sponsor a proposition like the Governor did with Proposition 50 involving redistricting, the Governor bypassed the electorate altogether for the years he has been in office.

The California Supreme Court is now reviewing the constitutionality and scope of the Governor’s request, including the separate review processes required for multiple-felony offenders such as Richard Allen Davis, Chester Turner and Michael Gargiulo. The District Attorney’s Office urges the Court to uphold individualized justice and reject mass clemency.

Kathy Cady, director of the Bureau of Victim Services for the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office, joined CJLF at a press conference today at 1 p.m. on the West Side Steps of the California State Capitol in Sacramento. She stood alongside Crime Victims United, Crime Survivors, law enforcement representatives, prosecutors, and murder victims’ family members to oppose the Governor’s mass commutation.

See list of 162 Los Angeles County murderers intended for clemency under Governor Newsom’s executive order.