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Resentencing Barred While Death Judgment Is on Appeal to State Supreme Court—C.A.
By a MetNews Staff Writer
A serial killer who was convicted of eight murders in the course of robberies and given eight death sentences is ineligible for resentencing under Penal Code §1172.75 because his appeal is pending before the California Supreme Court, Div. Four of the Court of Appeal for this district has determined.
The opinion by Justice Audra Mori, filed Thursday, affirms an order by Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Lisa B. Lench. She ruled that the Superior Court does not “have the right or the jurisdiction to modify this sentence,” saying that “the appropriate forum...is the Supreme Court.”
Defendant Bruce Millsap asserted on appeal that enactment of §1172.75 created an exception to the Supreme Court’s exclusive jurisdiction in capital cases, noting that it did not exempt such cases from the statute’s provisions.
Mori responded:
“Section 1172.75 was enacted in 2021 following decades of legislative and judicial understanding that the ‘automatic appeal’ process in capital cases takes ‘the entire judgment’ to the Supreme Court….We presume the Legislature understood this scope of the Court’s exclusive jurisdiction when enacting section 1172.75….Given this understanding, the Legislature did not need to expressly exempt capital judgments from section 1172.75 resentencing.”
She noted:
“Defendant currently faces eight separate death sentences and a consecutive term of more than 100 years to life in prison. Until defendant’s pending appeal is decided, and unless all eight of his death sentences are reversed, any order reducing his non-capital offenses will not result in a reduced period of incarceration, reduced prison overcrowding, or reduced prison expenditures.”
The case is People v. Millsap, 2025 S.O.S. 2463.
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