People v. Hwang
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The Court of Appeal reversed the trial court's denial of defendant's request to have his case transferred to juvenile court pursuant to the Public Safety and Rehabilitation Act of 2016 (Proposition 57) and Senate Bill No. 1391. Proposition 57 eliminated the ability of prosecutors to file charges against juveniles directly in a court of criminal jurisdiction.
The court explained that SB 1391 effectively broadens the ameliorative benefit of Proposition 57 to 14 and 15 year olds by prohibiting prosecuting attorneys from moving to transfer individuals who commit certain offenses when they were 14 or 15 years old to adult court, unless they were "not apprehended prior to the end of juvenile court jurisdiction." Therefore, SB 1391 applies retroactively to defendants whose judgments are not yet final. The court explained that the fact that defendant is now over 25 years old does not change the court's conclusion that he is entitled to the retroactive benefit of Welfare and Institutions section 707, subdivision (a)(2), if his conviction was not final when SB 1391 was enacted. In this case, defendant was apprehended when he was still 15 years old and therefore section 707, subdivision (a)(2)'s exclusion, by its plain terms, does not apply to him. Furthermore, because a resentencing under section 1170, subdivision (d)(1) replaces the original sentence, the original sentence is no longer operative, and the finality of the original sentence is no longer material. The court remanded to the trial court with directions for the matter to be transferred to the juvenile court for a juvenile adjudication.
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