California v. Gibson
Annotate this CaseIn 1996, defendant Clifton Gibson was tried as an adult and convicted of first degree murder with special circumstances, assault with a firearm, and robbery. These offenses were committed when he was 17 years old, with two adult codefendants. Gibson was ultimately sentenced to life without possibility of parole (LWOP) for the murder, consecutive to a determinate term of 12 years, four months, in prison. In 2014, he filed a petition to recall his sentence pursuant to Penal Code section 1170, subdivision (d)(2), which was denied by the trial court on the ground he failed to demonstrate he had been rehabilitated or that he was remorseful. Defendant appealed. On appeal, defendant argued the trial court: (1) improperly limited applicability of section 1170, subdivision (d)(2) relief to juvenile defendants who did not actually kill the victim; (2) abused its discretion in denying the petition despite evidence to support the existence of all the statutory factors; and (3) “flouted Miller [v. Alabama, 132 S.Ct. 2455 (2012)] and Gutierrez[58 Cal.4th 1354 (2014)].” Finding no reversible error, the Court of Appeal affirmed.
Some case metadata and case summaries were written with the help of AI, which can produce inaccuracies. You should read the full case before relying on it for legal research purposes.
This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.