{"id":35694,"date":"2021-05-27T15:45:22","date_gmt":"2021-05-27T22:45:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/?p=35694"},"modified":"2021-05-27T15:45:22","modified_gmt":"2021-05-27T22:45:22","slug":"california-senate-revisits-death-in-prison-law-judges-would-regain-discretion-in-cases-overwhelmingly-affecting-young-people-of-color","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/?p=35694","title":{"rendered":"CALIFORNIA SENATE REVISITS \u2018DEATH IN PRISON\u2019 LAW \u2013 JUDGES WOULD REGAIN DISCRETION IN CASES OVERWHELMINGLY AFFECTING YOUNG PEOPLE OF COLOR"},"content":{"rendered":"
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by\u00a0Mark Hedin<\/a><\/span>\u00a0|\u00a0May 27, 2021<\/span>\u00a0|\u00a0Other<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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By Mark Hedin, Ethnic Media Services<\/strong><\/p>\n

A little-known provision of California\u2019s criminal code condemns an average of three people per week \u2013 typically young adults of color \u2014 to spend the rest of their lives behind bars for being unwitting accomplices to crimes they did not personally commit.<\/p>\n

A measure now before the Senate,\u00a0SB 300<\/a>, would change the \u201cfelony murder special circumstance\u201d provisions of the penal code to allow a judge to sentence someone to 25-years-to-life in prison for those crimes, with the possibility of parole, instead of the current requirement of death or \u201cLWOP\u201d (life without possibility of parole).<\/p>\n

At a\u00a0May 24 press conference<\/a>, SB 300\u2019s author, State Sen. Dave Cortese (District 15, Santa Clara), was joined by co-authors Sydney Kamlager (30th\u00a0District, Los Angeles), Scott Weiner (District 11, San Francisco) and Nancy Skinner (District 9, Berkeley), in describing SB 300 and the injustices it addresses.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis bill has the power to provide a lifeline for hundreds of inmates,\u201d Cortese said, citing the average of 130 people per year sentenced to \u201cdeath by incarceration.\u201d<\/p>\n

There are currently 5,234 people incarcerated in California with LWOP sentences. Their average age at the time of their crimes was 19; 2,303 were 25 or younger. For 3,700, it was their first offense. Eighty percent are people of color, 70% black or Latinx.<\/p>\n

The story of one, Brian Mason, is told in\u00a0this video<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Mason was 18, a high school graduate driving a car he bought with job earnings, when he wound up in the wrong place at the wrong time.<\/p>\n

As he and some friends were leaving a party that had become uncomfortable, one went back to get a jacket he\u2019d left behind. A fight broke out and escalated to the point that his friend\u2019s younger brother fatally shot someone who was badly beating up the older brother.<\/p>\n

When police found a broken chain necklace at the scene, a felony robbery charge was added to the allegations, and Mason, who did not shoot anybody, did not have a gun, did not \u201caid and abet\u201d a murder or have intent to murder, was thus vulnerable under the special circumstances law, 190.2d. He was found guilty of \u201creckless indifference to human life\u201d and given an LWOP sentence.<\/p>\n

\u201cBrian Mason\u2019s story is all day every day,\u201d Kamlager said. \u201cThis law is incredibly inhumane.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cStudies show that cognitive development doesn\u2019t stop till the age of 25. Studies also show that by the time someone turns 40, their desire to engage in criminal behavior drops precipitously,\u201d Kamlager said. \u201cAnd yet we continue to support and demand laws on the books that keep someone in prison for life.\u201d<\/p>\n

Also in attendance at the press conference were the mothers of two young men serving LWOP sentences and Susan Bustamante, 66, who served 31 years in prison before then-Governor Brown commuted her sentence in 2017.<\/p>\n

One of the moms, Joanne Scheer, described her son, Tony, as a civilian Marine Corps worker accompanying a friend picking up a laptop computer when the encounter turned deadly.<\/p>\n

The prosecutor deemed the matter of retrieving personal property a burglary, allowing the special circumstances law to apply.<\/p>\n

\u201cTony stole nothing. Neither did he kill anybody. He was in the room when one of the two he was with, a war veteran, suffered an episode of PTSD during an argument and shot and killed a young man.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cAll the prosecutor had to prove what that he was present in the room,\u201d she said. When she tells the story, she said, \u201cPeople think I\u2019m leaving something out.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cA prosecutor is asking juries to consider the chief charge,\u201d Kamlager explained. \u201cIf you find the chief charge to be true, do you find the special circumstances to be true? That second question is a true-or-false question. It lowers the burden of proof for proving the special circumstances.\u201d<\/p>\n

In Bustamante\u2019s case, she was not present when her brother killed her abusive husband, a PTSD-afflicted Vietnam veteran.<\/p>\n

\u201cBecause I was the wife, I was charged,\u201d she said. By the time of her trial, her brother was dead. \u201cI was not allowed to bring up the abuse, or the molestation. My husband wasn\u2019t on trial, I was, was what they told me, so I had no defense. I was given the LWOP sentence. I had no prior convictions, no arrests,\u00a0nothing<\/i>.\u201d<\/p>\n

In 2017, then-Gov. Jerry Brown commuted Bustamante\u2019s sentence. She was paroled the next year.<\/p>\n

\u201cSB 300, if passed, will help the LWOP population who are convicted of felony murder. I am honored to be a part of this bill and so hopeful for the women inside that it will pass,\u201d she said, fighting back tears. \u201cThere are so many who should never have gotten this \u2018death by incarceration\u2019 sentence.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI served 31 years, missing so much of my life and the lives of my daughters and family,\u201d she said, \u201cfor a crime I didn\u2019t commit.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by\u00a0Mark Hedin\u00a0|\u00a0May 27, 2021\u00a0|\u00a0Other By Mark...<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-35694","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ca-local"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35694","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=35694"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35694\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":35695,"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35694\/revisions\/35695"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=35694"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=35694"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=35694"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}