Gov. Gavin Newsom on Thursday commuted the death sentences of all 548 inmates on California’s death row, prompting swift and sharp criticism from district attorneys, law enforcement and advocates of homicide victims.
Newsom reduced the death sentences to life in prison without the possibility of parole. The move marks the largest mass grant of executive clemency in modern U.S. history.
The decision applies to 529 men and 19 women currently held on California’s death row, which is the largest condemned population in the Western Hemisphere.
In defense of his executive action, the Democratic governor framed capital punishment as an irredeemable mechanism within an imperfect judicial system.
“State-sanctioned killing is incompatible with California’s legal values,” Newsom wrote in what he called an “Open Letter to All Californians.”
Newsom, who is leaving office in January after being termed-out, said he accepts “sole political and personal responsibility” for the decision, while acknowledging the profound grief and backlash the action would bring to victims’ families. Newsom has had a moratorium on the state carrying out executions since he signed an executive order on March 13, 2019, but a future governor can overturn that.
California has not executed anyone since 2006. However, local district attorneys across California have continued to seek capital sentences in trial courts.
Newsom’s announcement of the commuted sentences drew condemnation from crime victim advocates, prosecutors and law enforcement groups, who noted that California voters repeatedly rejected statewide ballot initiatives to repeal the death penalty, most recently affirming capital punishment in 2012 and 2016. Critics argue that the problem with broad executive clemency is that it overrides jury verdicts and legal statutes enacted by voters.
Los Angeles County Deputy District Attorney Jonathan Hatami slammed Newsom’s decision, pointing specifically to the murder of 8-year-old Gabriel Fernandez, whose killer’s death sentence was commuted under the action.
“Newsom, the same person who supported & backed Gascón in SF and LA, unilaterally, without talking to Gabriel’s family, just commuted Gabriel’s killers sentence,” Hatami said in an X post. Hatami was referring to former Los Angeles County District Attorney George Gascón, who was criticized for being soft on crime.
“To me, little Gabriel will always be an example of courage. His case, his life, his death and his trial will always be with his family, with my family, with his friends and with our community,” Hatami said. “No matter what Newsom did today, Gabriel will never be forgotten.”
Hatami recounted the horrific details of the abuse Gabriel suffered and the trial testimony that led to the death penalty verdict.
“The ultimate punishment is truly appropriate for the defendant, even though it does not even compare to what the defendant did to Gabriel,” Hatami added, quoting his trial arguments. “No one who does this to a child can ever be called a victim. A victim is a child who was muffled and stuffed in a box. Who was forced to eat cat litter and cat feces. Who was forced to eat his own vomit. Gabriel is truly an example of courage. The defendant, on the other hand, is a true example of an evil coward.”
Meanwhile, human rights groups praised Newsom’s decision as a landmark shift in criminal justice reform. Amnesty International USA Executive Director Nadia Daar called the mass commutation a “decisive and powerful step away from the use of the death penalty.”
“Governor Newsom’s decision turns that long pause into meaningful and lasting progress against an inherently cruel, discriminatory and irreversible system,” Daar said in a press release.