Polly Klaas Convicted Murderer Getting Resentencing Hearing Friday

This article has been updated, below.

After running for governor on a vow to uphold California voters’ support of the death penalty, Governor Gavin Newsom announced in March 2019, shortly after taking office, that he would grant reprieves for all death penalty murderers on California’s death row. He called the death penalty “ineffective, irreversible and immoral.”

Newsom then signed an executive order putting a moratorium on the executions of the 737 inmates currently incarcerated in California’s death row.

This was a gut punch to Marc Klaas, the father of 12-year-old Polly Klaas, who was brutally raped and murdered in 1993 by Richard Allen Davis. Marc Klaas said it was even worse than just re-victimization, in an interview and video with the California Senate Republican Caucus. Klaas said Gov. Gavin Newsom invited Klaas and six other families invested in victims rights to the Capitol to discuss creating some kind of balance for crime victims. But, Klaas said one hour into the meeting, the governor duped all of them when he shockingly announced that he was going to declare a moratorium on the death penalty.

“I had no idea that was coming,” Klaas said. “That came out of nowhere.”

Klaas said the only reason he and the other families were in the meeting with Newsom “was so he could say ‘I told them before I made the announcement.’”

“Did I feel like I was being victimized again? Are you kidding me?” Klaas said. “After spending 25 years with the expectation that the sentence would finally be carried out on Polly’s killer, to have the governor kind of look me in the eye and say he was declaring a moratorium… I can’t be the one to execute 700 people.”

Flash forward to 2024: Convicted murderer Richard Allen Davis has been granted a resentencing hearing Friday April 5th.

Marc Klaas said in a Globe interview that Davis has legal representation from out of state attorneys. “Who is doing this?” he asked. Indeed, who is doing this and who is funding this defense?

Polly Klaas was having a slumber party in 1993 at her Petaluma, CA home, when a strange man holding a knife entered her bedroom, tied up all the girls and put pillow cases over their heads. The intruder then kidnapped Polly, raped her, killed her, and discarded her body off of the side of the freeway hidden under a piece of plywood. Her body was not found for two months.

Evidence at the crime scene led authorities to Richard Allen Davis. He eventually confessed to kidnapping and killing Polly, and he showed investigators where he buried her body.

So why is Davis getting a resentencing hearing this week?

Davis was tried and convicted of 10 felony counts including first-degree murder, burglary, robbery, kidnapping, and attempting to perform a lewd act.

At the sentencing portion of Davis’s trial, the jury recommended the death penalty, and he was sentenced to death. As Davis left the courtroom he flipped off the court with both middle fingers.

In the meantime, California’s Three Strikes Law was passed by the California Legislature and signed into law.

However, as the Sonoma County District Attorney’s office explains in their response to recall capital sentence pursuant to Penal Code 1172.75:

Senate Bill 483 was enacted in 2021 and became effective on January 1, 2022. (Stats. 2021 ch. 728 § 3 [SB 483].) It added Section 1172.75, which stated that sentencing enhancements imposed under Section 667.5(b) are now legally invalid and provided a procedure to identify and resentence individuals who are currently serving invalid sentences. (Pen. Code § 1172.75.) The defendant was identified by the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation as being potentially eligible
for relief.

Senate Bill 483 was authored by Sen. Ben Allen (D-Santa Monica) and removed sentence enhancements retroactively:

As shown above in the table above, 2 of the 31 years in the defendant’s determinate sentence are based on now-invalid prior prison terms. On February 13, 2024, the defendant filed a motion to recall the entire judgment, including the death sentence, purportedly under the authority of Section 1172.75. The People herein oppose.

SB 483 was sponsored by the Ella Baker Center for Human Rights, which also sponsored one of the worst imaginable anti-criminal justice bills last year, SB 94 by Sen. Dave Cortese (D-Santa Clara), which would allow an individual serving a sentence of life imprisonment without possibility of parole due to special circumstance murder, to petition the court to recall the sentence and re-sentence to a lesser sentence if:

• the offense occurred before June 5, 1990

• they served at least 25 years in custody

SB 94 was shelved in 2023, but expect it to come back at some point. It was co-sponsored by Felony Murder Elimination Project, Ella Baker Center for Human Rights, Families United to End LWOP (FUEL), California Coalition for Women Prisoners, Sister Warriors Freedom Coalition, Californians United for a Responsible Budget (CURB), Anti-Recidivism Coalition (ARC), Center for Employment Opportunities, Drop LWOP Coalition and Families Against Mandatory Minimums.

None of these organizations ever shows remorse or care for the victims and their families. They are all anti-criminal justice, and seek to eliminate the felony murder rule from California law. Since California’s Three Strikes law was passed, Democrats and organizations such as these have diligently worked to undermine it, and successfully with passage of AB 109 (prison realignment), Proposition 47 and Proposition 57.

The Sonoma DA says Davis is not entitled to challenge his capital sentence under Section 1172.75.

Marc Klass explained that there are competing penal code sections at work here. The one Davis’s legal team is relying on, 1172.75, includes a specific disqualifier for inmates with prior convictions for a sexually violent offense. “According to him, the fact that Section 1172.75 is silent as to capital inmates must mean that capital sentences are eligible for recall and resentencing. Essentially, the defendant is describing the doctrine of expressio
unius est exclusion alterius, meaning “[t]he expression of some things in a statute necessarily means the exclusion of other things not expressed.”

Richard Allen Davis and his lawyers are playing word games.

The Sonoma County District Attorney’s opposition to recall of Davis’s capital sentence pursuant to penal code section 1172.75 is correct that a recall of a capital sentence is not authorized under the section, and the court should deny his motion on April 5, 2024, in Department 29, County of Santa Clara Superior Court, Marc Klaas’ statement says.

“If my family can be subjected to the possible recall of capital sentence of a condemned murderer who, prior to murdering Polly, had multiple convictions for violence towards women and was diagnosed as a sexually sadistic psychopath, then any victim’s family who thought that justice was served in the courtroom is in for a shocking new reality.”

“If Polly’s killer is somehow able to prevail, this is the tip of the iceberg. Thousands of violent offenders will follow suit, so lock your doors, protect your children, and pray that your family does not fall prey to the violence and destruction that is sure to follow.”

Klaas said he did a public records request and discovered there are at least another 10,000 convicted felons who also will be able to petition the court for resentencing. “This will tie up District Attorneys and courts for a long time,” Klaas said.

Perhaps that is the purpose.

“How can they unravel a judge’s sentence,” Klaas asked. “Who do these people think they are? He’s [Davis] been given every legal consideration since he was arrested.”

“And he was turned down by the California Supreme Court.”

Klaas said Richard Allen Davis isn’t even in San Quentin any longer, and is at a mental facility in Stockton – awaiting resentencing.

The Globe will follow up after the April 5th hearing.

UPDATE 4/4/2024: Senator Allen provided an update and statement about his bill Senate Bill 483.

“Our law was definitely not intended to undo the death sentences of condemned child killers and any attempt to argue otherwise is wildly off-base. The only part of sentencing that SB 483 allows the court to reconsider are the two one-year enhancements Davis received because of prior felony convictions. There’s nothing in the statute that requires the court to reconsider his death sentence, which is subject to an entirely different sentencing procedure that our bill did not touch.  This is a desperate act by a despicable man and his lawyers and they’re off on a total legal limb here. Needless to say, I agree with the prosecutors on this issue, expect them to prevail in court, and am happy to assist with their efforts in this case.”

Here is the Sonoma County DA’s opposition to Davis’ resentencing: