DA Challenges Accomplice Murder Law

A bill (SB1413) signed into law in 2018 by California Governor Jerry Brown, which prohibits charging some accomplices to murder with murder, and allows reduced sentences to those previously convicted as accomplices to murder, is being challenged by the Ventura County District Attorney.  Megan Diskin of the Ventura County Star reports that the District Attorney is appealing a Second District Court of Appeal ruling, which upheld the law, to the state Supreme Court.

The appellate court ruling stems from a petition for resentencing by Maria Bucio who in 2008 was convicted of robbery and first degree murder for assisting her nephew in robbing and killing an Oxnard businessman.  Under SB1413, because Bucio did not actually kill the victim and was not a “major participant” in the murder, she is eligible for a reduced sentence.  After a Superior Court judge denied Bucio’s petition, finding the new law unconstitutional, she appealed.  The District Attorney argued that the new law unconstitutionally overrides two initiatives; Proposition 7 adopted in 1978, and Proposition 115 adopted in 1990.  Both initiatives changed the sentences for murder as defined by existing law.  The DA notes that a legislative statute which changes the definition of murder to give defendants a reduced sentence, violates the intent of both initiatives to punish a specific crime with a specific sentence.   “For decades, the law has been clear that if you go looking for trouble you are responsible for all the trouble you find. And if the trouble you find results in murder, you get a life sentence,” said Ventura County Chief Deputy District Attorney Chuck Hughes.   If the Supreme Court upholds the new law, it will effect roughly 50 petitions for resentencing by accomplice murderers in Ventura County.