Filed 7/30/26 P. v. Williams CA2/2
NOT TO BE PUBLISHED IN THE OFFICIAL REPORTS
California Rules of Court, rule 8.1115(a), prohibits courts and parties from citing or relying on opinions
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IN THE COURT OF APPEAL OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA
SECOND APPELLATE DISTRICT
DIVISION TWO
THE PEOPLE, B345064
Plaintiff and Respondent, (Los Angeles County
Super. Ct. No.
v. TA065230)
DANIEL C. WILLIAMS,
Defendant and Appellant.
APPEAL from an order of the Superior Court of
Los Angeles County, Carol J. Najera, Judge. Affirmed.
Christine M. Aros, under appointment by the Court of
Appeal, for Defendant and Appellant.
Rob Bonta, Attorney General, Charles C. Ragland, Chief
Assistant Attorney General, Susan Sullivan Pithey, Assistant
Attorney General, David E. Madeo and Viet H. Nguyen, Deputy
Attorneys General, for Plaintiff and Respondent.
______________________________
Defendant and appellant Daniel C. Williams (Williams)
appeals from the trial court’s order denying his petition for recall
of sentence pursuant to Penal Code section 1170, subdivision
(d)(1).1 We affirm.
BACKGROUND
I. Conviction and Sentencing2
In 2002, a jury found Williams guilty of second degree
murder. (§ 187, subd. (a).) The jury also found true allegations
that, among other things, Williams personally and intentionally
discharged a firearm causing death (§ 12022.53, subd. (d)) and
that he committed the murder for the benefit of, at the direction
of, and in association with a criminal street gang (§ 186.22,
subd. (b)(1)). The trial court sentenced Williams to a total term of
50 years to life in state prison.
On direct appeal, this court struck the 10-year gang
enhancement (§ 186.22, subd. (b)(1)) and ordered it replaced with
a 15-year minimum parole eligibility date (§ 186.22, subd. (b)(5)).
(People v. Williams (Apr. 13, 2004, B164593) [nonpub. opn.],
2004 WL 788847, at pp. *7–*8.) The judgment was otherwise
affirmed. (Id. at p. *8.) As a result, Williams’s sentence was
reduced to 40 years to life.
II. Petition for Recall of Sentence
In 2024, Williams filed a petition for recall of sentence
pursuant to section 1170, subdivision (d)(1). Williams asserted
that he was 17 years old at the time of the crime and had been
1 All statutory references are to the Penal Code.
2 We omit a summary of the facts underlying Williams’s
conviction because they are not relevant to the issue on appeal.
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incarcerated for more than 20 years. Relying on People v. Heard
(2022) 83 Cal.App.5th 608 (Heard), Williams argued that he was
entitled to relief because he had been sentenced to the functional
equivalent of life without the possibility of parole (LWOP). The
People opposed the petition.
On March 21, 2025, the trial court denied the petition for
recall of sentence on the ground that Williams’s 40-years-to-life
sentence was not the functional equivalent of LWOP. Williams
filed a timely notice of appeal.
DISCUSSION
I. Standard of Review
We apply de novo review where, as here, the appeal turns
on questions of law and the application of law to undisputed
facts. (People v. Ashford University, LLC (2024) 100 Cal.App.5th
485, 518.)
II. Relevant Law
Under section 1170, subdivision (d)(1)(A), “[w]hen a
defendant who was under 18 years of age at the time of the
commission of the offense for which the defendant was sentenced
to imprisonment for life without the possibility of parole has been
incarcerated for at least 15 years, the defendant may submit to
the sentencing court a petition for recall and resentencing.”
“[B]y its own terms,” section 1170, subdivision (d)(1)(A)
applies to juvenile offenders sentenced to LWOP. (People v.
Olmos (2025) 109 Cal.App.5th 580, 583.) A split of authority has
emerged concerning the applicability of the statute to juvenile
offenders sentenced to the functional equivalent of LWOP, which
is a “ ‘term of years with a parole eligibility date that falls outside
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the juvenile offender’s natural life expectancy.’ [Citation.]”
(People v. Sorto (2024) 104 Cal.App.5th 435, 440, 443 (Sorto).)
Some courts have held that “denying juvenile offenders,
who were sentenced to the functional equivalent of [LWOP], the
opportunity to petition for resentencing violates the guarantee of
equal protection.” (Heard, supra, 83 Cal.App.5th at p. 612; see
also People v. Cabrera (2025) 111 Cal.App.5th 650, 653 (Cabrera);
Sorto, supra, 104 Cal.App.5th at pp. 440, 454.) Other courts have
concluded that the availability of a youth offender parole hearing
under section 3051 renders moot this equal protection concern.
(See People v. Lara (2025) 115 Cal.App.5th 484, 487–488, review
granted Dec. 30, 2025, S294095 (Lara); People v. Isayev (2025)
113 Cal.App.5th 1117, 1141–1144, review granted Nov. 12, 2025,
S292860; People v. Ortega (2025) 111 Cal.App.5th 1252, 1260,
1265, review granted Sept. 17, 2025, S292070.)
III. Williams Is Not Entitled to Seek Recall of His 40-
Years-to-Life Sentence
The trial court properly denied Williams’s section 1170,
subdivision (d)(1) petition because his 40-years-to-life sentence—
rendering him parole eligible, at the latest, at the age of 57—is
not the functional equivalent of LWOP. Williams’s parole
eligibility does not “fall[] outside” his “natural life expectancy[,]”
and accordingly, his sentence does not “effectively condemn[]”
him “to die in prison” as would “an explicit LWOP sentence.”
(Sorto, supra, 104 Cal.App.5th at p. 451; see also People v.
Baldwin (2025) 113 Cal.App.5th 978, 999 [44-years-to-life
sentence with parole eligibility at age 60 was “not clearly outside
[the defendant’s] natural lifetime”].) For this reason, we need not
consider whether his entitlement to a section 3051 youth offender
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parole hearing at an even younger age also precludes him from
obtaining relief under section 1170, subdivision (d)(1).
Williams has cited no case, and we are aware of none, that
has held that sentencing a juvenile offender to 40-years-to-life or
less is the functional equivalent of LWOP. In People v. Contreras
(2018) 4 Cal.5th 349, 369, the California Supreme Court held, in
the context of a nonhomicide offense, “that a sentence of 50 years
to life is functionally equivalent to LWOP” for purposes of the
Eighth Amendment. Courts of Appeal have disagreed, however,
on whether a 50-years-to-life sentence is the functional
equivalent of LWOP for the purpose of an equal protection
challenge to section 1170, subdivision (d)(1). (Compare Cabrera,
supra, 111 Cal.App.5th at p. 653 [50-years-to-life sentence is the
functional equivalent of LWOP], with People v. Munoz (2025)
110 Cal.App.5th 499, 503, review granted June 25, 2025, S290828
[50-years-to-life sentence is not the functional equivalent of
LWOP].) Given that Williams’s sentence is 10 years less than the
sentences at issue in Contreras and Cabrera, those cases are
distinguishable.
Relying solely on People v. Lopez (2016) 4 Cal.App.5th 649
(Lopez), Williams argues that, when assessing whether he was
sentenced to the functional equivalent of LWOP, we should
consider the nonfinal, 50-years-to-life sentence he originally
received before it was corrected to 40 years to life on direct
appeal. We disagree.
In Lopez, the defendants were sentenced to LWOP when
they were minors. More than 15 years later, the trial court
granted the defendants’ habeas corpus petitions and reduced
their sentences to life with the possibility of parole, as required
by Graham v. Florida (2010) 560 U.S. 48. Then, the defendants
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filed petitions to recall their sentences under section 1170, former
subdivision (d)(2). The People argued that the defendants were
no longer entitled to relief under that section because their
sentences had already been reduced. The Court of Appeal
concluded that the defendants “should not be precluded from
obtaining further relief pursuant to a subsequently enacted
remedial statute which addresses vindication of the same
constitutional right.” (Lopez, supra, 4 Cal.App.5th at p. 651.)
The concerns at issue in Lopez are not present here, where
Williams’s initial unauthorized sentence was corrected on direct
appeal rather than through postconviction habeas relief years
later in order to vindicate a constitutional right. (See Lara,
supra, 115 Cal.App.5th at p. 487, fn. 3 [Lopez “is factually
distinguishable from the Heard line of cases”].)
Because Williams was not sentenced to LWOP or its
functional equivalent, he is not entitled to seek recall of his
sentence under section 1170, subdivision (d)(1).
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DISPOSITION
The trial court’s order of March 21, 2025, is affirmed.
NOT TO BE PUBLISHED IN THE OFFICIAL REPORTS.
GOORVITCH, J.
We concur:
CHAVEZ, Acting P. J.
RICHARDSON, J.
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