Citing the suffering of the victims of violent and often horrendous crimes, prosecutors in California say they will challenge a decision by the leftist governor, Gavin Newsom, who reportedly is considering a run for the presidency, to cancel all 548 death sentences that were pending in the state.
Newsom made that announcement this week, affirming immediate leniency for about one-third of the murderers, while the other two-thirds of the cases require a review by judges in the state.
It was Anne Marie Schubert, a former district attorney who now leads the Criminal Justice Legal Foundation, who informed a publication there the legal fight is coming.
“There’s going to be a number of arguments that we will make, but at the end of the day, we are doing this on behalf of crime victims and the rule of law,” she said.
According to a report at Breitbart district attorneys across the state are delivering “blowback” to the governor’s plans.
The California Post said prosecutors are “furious over the decision and began highlighting murder victims.”
Those who would benefit include child murderers and a notorious serial killer.
“One district attorney cited the brutal rape and homicide cases of Rachel Newhouse and Aundria Crawford, college students who were killed in the late 1990s by Rex Allan Krebs, a paroled serial rapist and killer who preyed on women in central California,” the report said.
Krebs had abducted and bound Newhouse in an abandoned cabin and raped and sodomized her before taking her life.
“His rape homicides were so brutal he became the subject of a true crime book Dead and Buried: A True Story of Serial Rape and Murder,” the report said.
Another case that delivered nightmares was that of Michael Whisenhunt, condemned to death for torturing the 20-month-old daughter of his girlfriend so violently her intestines were severed.
“Governor Newsom just told the families of Rachel Newhouse, Aundria Crawford, Kesha Gurke, and every other innocent victim of California’s 548 condemned killers that the killers’ lives matter more,” Dan Dow, the district attorney for San Luis Obispo County, said in a statement posted on Instagram.
The two-thirds of those lined up for leniency must have their cases further reviewed because of a state requirement before commutations for anyone twice convicted of a felony in the state.
That affects 382 of the 548 convicts.
Greg Totten of the California District Attorneys Association said the process of commutation “was never intended to serve as a substitute for the legislative process or to allow one elected official to effectively nullify hundreds of jury verdicts simply because he disagrees with the law.”
WND had reported on Newsom’s scheme.
“I take this action because I firmly believe that state-sanctioned killing is incompatible with California’s values, undermines the foundations Of our legal system, and diminishes each Of us. I know we cannot execute people in our imperfect legal system and remain true to our core values, first among them justice and human decency,” he claimed.
BREAKING: California Governor Gavin Newsom said he will commute the death sentences of all 548 inmates currently condemned to execution in his state, the largest death row in the Western Hemisphere https://t.co/XdLatmxbQq https://t.co/SmsICimpaA
— Reuters (@Reuters) November 5, 2026
Voters in the state several times have refused to abolish capital punishment.
