by Sam Rutherford

The California Court of Appeal, Second Appellate District, held that youthful defendants who receive sentences that are “functionally equivalent” to sentences of life without parole (“LWOP”) are entitled to resentencing under Cal. Pen. Code, § 1170, subd. (d) based on the constitutional guarantee of equal protection.

Background

In August 2005, when he was just 15 years old, Eddie Sorto committed a series of crimes against rival gang members, including first-degree murder, second-degree murder, assault, and shooting at an occupied vehicle. A jury convicted him of these charges and also found true multiple special-circumstance allegations and enhancements. The trial court sentenced him to a determinate term of 10 years plus an indeterminate term of 130 years to life. He was not eligible for a LWOP sentence because he was under 18 when he committed the crimes. Nonetheless, the sentence he received didmake him parole eligible during his expected lifetime, i.e., after 25 years under § 3051.

In 2010, the U.S. Supreme Court held that the Eighth Amendment prohibits LWOP sentences for juvenile offenders who committed nonhomicide offenses. Graham v. Florida, 560 U.S. 48 (2010). Two years later, Graham was extended to prohibit sentencing schemes that mandate LWOP sentences for juvenile offenders convicted of certain homicide offenses. Miller v. Alabama, 567 U.S. 460 (2012).

Two months later, in People v. Caballero, 282 P.3d 291 (Cal. 2012), the California Supreme Court held that the prohibition on LWOP sentences for nonhomicide juvenile offenders also applies to term-of-years sentences that are functionally equivalent to LWOP. The Caballero Court further held that a sentence is functionally equivalent to LWOP if it includes a “term of years with a parole eligibility date that falls outside the juvenile offender’s natural life expectancy.”

Against this backdrop, the California Legislature enacted and then amended Cal. Pen. Code, § 1170(d) and § 3051(b). Section 1170 provides, in relevant part, that “[w]hen a defendant who was under 18 years of age at the time of the commission of the offense for which the defendant was sentenced to imprisonment for life without the possibility of parole has been incarcerated for at least 15 years, the defendant may submit to the sentencing court a petition for recall and resentencing.” § 1170(d)(1)(A).

The petition must include a statement describing the defendant’s remorse and work towards rehabilitation and demonstrate that one of four qualifying circumstances is true. The qualifying circumstances are that the defendant (1) was convicted of felony or aiding and abetting murder, (2) does not have prior juvenile adjudications for felony assault or other felonies with the significant potential to harm victims, (3) had at least one adult codefendant, or (4) has performed acts that tend to indicate rehabilitation or the potential for rehabilitation. § 1170(d)(2)(A)-(D).

If the trial court finds by a preponderance of the evidence that one or more of the four qualifying circumstances is true, it “shall recall the sentence and commitment previously ordered and hold a hearing to resentence the defendant in the same manner as if the defendant had not previously been sentenced, provided that the new sentence, if any, is not greater than the initial sentence.” § 1170(d)(5).

Section 3051(b) also requires the Board of Parole Hearings to conduct a “youth offender parole hearing” at specified times during the incarceration of certain youthful defendants. Under this statute, young adult and juvenile offenders convicted of a controlling offense “for which the sentence is a life term of 25 years to life shall be eligible for release on parole at a youth offender parole hearing during the person’s 25th year of incarceration.” § 3051(b)(3). Most juvenile defendants sentenced to explicit LWOP terms are also eligible for parole during their 25th year of incarceration. § 3051(b)(4).

In 2022, the Court of Appeal, Fourth Appellate District, held that § 1170(d) applies only to youthful defendants who received actual LWOP sentences. People v. Heard, 83 Cal. App. 5th 608 (2022). The Heard Court, however, also concluded that excluding youthful defendants who received the functional equivalent of LWOP sentences from seeking resentencing under this statute violates equal protection because it was “unable to identify a rational basis for making juveniles sentenced to an explicitly designated life without parole term, but not juveniles sentenced to the functional equivalent of life without parole, eligible to petition for resentencing under section 1170, subdivision (d)(1).”

The youthful defendant in Heard received a term-of-years sentence similar to Sorto’s, which the Heard Court described as functionally equivalent to LWOP. Thus, the court ruled that he was eligible for recall and resentencing under § 1170(d) in light of its equal protection ruling.

In 2023, Sorto filed a petition to recall his 100-plus year sentence under § 1170(d) as interpreted in Heard. The People opposed the petition, asserting that Sorto was not serving a sentence functionally equivalent to LWOP because he was eligible for parole under § 3051(b) after his 25th year of imprisonment. The trial court agreed with the People and denied the petition. It further concluded, without explanation, that the Heard decision was not “on point with our specific factual scenario.” Sorto timely appealed.

Analysis

Sorto argued on appeal that the trial court erred in refusing to follow Heard and urged the Court to adopt Heard’s holding that § 1170(d) violates equal protection by distinguishing between youthful defendants who received LWOP sentences and youthful defendants who received sentences functionally equivalent to LWOP.

The Court began by noting that where, as here, “the challenged law is not based on a suspect classification and does not burden fundamental rights, the law denies equal protection ‘only if there is no rational relationship between a disparity in treatment and some legitimate government purpose.’” Quoting People v. Chatman, 410 P.3d 9 (Cal. 2018). This means that “courts no longer need to ask at the threshold whether the two groups are similarly situated for purposes of the law in question. The only pertinent inquiry is whether the challenged difference in treatment is adequately justified under the applicable standard of review.” People v. Hardin, 543 P.3d 960 (Cal. 2024). That standard is rational basis review, which is met if “there is no conceivable rational basis for the unequal treatment.” Chatman.

In Hardin, the California Supreme Court held that § 3051(b) does not violate equal protection by denying youthful defendants sentenced to LWOP an opportunity for release after 25 years while granting youthful defendants sentenced to functionally equivalent LWOP terms that right. The court determined that it “was not irrational for the Legislature to exclude from youth offender parole eligibility those young adults who have committed special circumstance murder, an offense deemed sufficiently culpable that it merits society’s most stringent sanctions.”

The People argued that Hardin, decided after Heard, undermined Heard’s conclusion that § 1170(d) violates equal protection because it showed that LWOP sentenced youthful offenders and youthful offenders with sentences functionally equivalent to LWOP are not entitled to the same treatment under the law. Instead, the People argued that the functional equivalent analysis should be limited to the Eighth Amendment context.

The Court, however, rejected this argument, stating instead that “Hardin supports Heard.” As the Court explained, while Hardin ruled that “the Legislature reasonably may disfavor explicit LWOP offenders based on the rationale that they are more culpable than functionally equivalent LWOP offenders,” the case does not stand for the proposition that “it is reasonable to grant relief to explicit LWOP offenders while denying the same relief to functionally equivalent LWOP offenders.” Heard correctly held that it is not, according to the Court.

The People next argued that Heard is inconsistent with another California Supreme Court decision, People v. Franklin, 370 P.3d 1053 (Cal. 2016), in which a juvenile offender argued his 50-year-to-life sentence was the functional equivalent of LWOP and was unconstitutional under Miller. The court rejected this argument because § 3051(b) retroactively made him eligible for parole on his 25th year of imprisonment, and a 25-year-to-life sentence is not functionally equivalent to LWOP because it is not more than the juvenile’s life expectancy.

But the Court also rejected this argument, concluding that § 1170(d) focuses on a youthful defendant’s past not present-tense sentence. In other words, the statute asks not what sentence the defendant is currently serving, but instead, whether the defendant “was sentenced” to LWOP. See § 1170(d)(1)(A); see also People v. Lopez, 4 Cal. App. 5th 649 (2016) (noting this distinction).

As the Heard Court recognized, “although under Franklin, the defendant’s sentence as it currently operates is no longer the functional equivalent of life without parole, this does not change the fact that the sentence was a functionally equivalent life without parole sentence at the time it was imposed.” (cleaned up) Thus, the Court reasoned that under the plain language of § 1170(d), as interpreted in Heard and Lopez, the statute “does not require that the defendant currently be serving an LWOP.” Instead, what matters is whether the defendant “‘was sentenced’ to the functional equivalent of LWOP,” the Court stated. Quoting § 1170(d)(1)(A).

Construed this way, § 1170(d) provides an effective mechanism for youthful defendants sentenced to functionally equivalent LWOP terms to obtain relief. The statute requires trial courts to resentence such defendants “as if the defendant had not previously been sentenced.” § 1170(d)(5). This is not “merely procedural” because at resentencing the “trial court has broad discretion to select the term of imprisonment, run sentences concurrently or consecutively, and strike or dismiss enhancements,” the Court stated. Citing §§ 186.22(d); 669; 1385; 12022(f). The Court instructed that resentencing under § 1170(d) “also entitles eligible offenders to the benefits of retroactive ameliorative changes to the law.” Citing People v. Padilla, 509 P.3d 975 (Cal. 2022).

Like Heard, the Court determined that there is simply no rational basis for granting the potential for such sweeping relief at resentencing under § 1170(d) to only those youthful defendants who received explicit LWOP sentences while denying the opportunity to youthful defendants who received functionally equivalent sentences. The People’s arguments based on moral principles, empirical data, or fiscal concerns did not alter the Court’s conclusion.

In fact, Sorto’s case clearly demonstrated the statute’s irrationality, according to the Court. Sorto was found guilty of special circumstance first-degree murder, which typically carries a mandatory LWOP sentence, but because he was only 15 years old at the time, he received a mandatory sentence of 25 years to life. Had he committed the murder after his 18th birthday, he would have received an LWOP sentence and be entitled to resentencing under the plain language of § 1170(d). But defendants under 18 are by law less culpable than older defendants, so it makes no sense to deny them access to the same potential relief that the more culpable group is unquestionably entitled to even though both groups were initially sentenced to terms guaranteeing they would die in prison. The Court declared: “We can conceive of no rational basis that would justify such a seemingly unreasonable result.”

Conclusion

Accordingly, the Court followed the ruling in Heard and concluded that § 1170(d) violates equal protection to the extent it denies youthful defendants who received functionally equivalent LWOP sentences the right to seek resentencing under the statute. Thus, the Court reversed the order denying Sorto’s 1170(d) petition and remanded the case for the trial court to determine in the first instance what relief, if any, he should receive under the statute’s other requirements. See: People v. Sorto, 104 Cal. App. 5th 435 (2024).  

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