The grieving families of slain crime victims gathered outside the state Capitol last week to urge California legislators to pass Senate Bill 1157 and Assembly Bill 2040 – proposed legislation seeking tougher juvenile justice standards. Both bills were quietly killed behind closed doors.
Relatives of Lorenso Sanchez, Sergio Bonboster, Pablo Rodriguez and Caleb Quick – young people who were all killed by juvenile offenders – joined state legislators, probation officers and law enforcement leaders to publicly address their concerns. Speakers said the state changed how it handles its most serious juvenile offenders – by closing the Division of Juvenile Justice (DJJ) and shifting the care of serious youth offenders from state prisons to county-run facilities.
But, they argued, they did so without incorporating the necessary safeguards to match, which they hoped to implement via the two proposed bills, said proponents. SB 1157 would require that courts receive basic safety information before a young person in legal court custody is placed in a private residential program. The bill passed the state Senate in May and was held in the Assembly Appropriations Committee’s suspense file on Aug. 13 without a floor vote.
AB 2040, known as Lorenso’s Law, also failed this past session. It would have restored the ability of judges to transfer youth offenders charged with the most serious crimes – including murder, rape and kidnapping – to an adult court under the standard voters approved in Prop 57.
“Lorenso did everything right. He should be starting his senior year right now, not a headstone,” said Julia Sanchez, the mother of Lorenso Sanchez, a high school athlete and straight-A student who was fatally stabbed by a 15-year-old perpetrator. “They had the chance to act, and they chose silence instead. I am not done fighting, and I am not going away.”
Six years after California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed for the closure of DJJ, current youth placements still lack a consistent statewide safety standard, said Contra Costa Chief Probation Officer Esa Ehmen-Krause, president of the Chief Probation Officers of California (CPOC).
“To make a placement recommendation, probation needs reliable information about the programs where young people may be placed,” said Ehmen-Krause. “These are not barriers to rehabilitation; they are safeguards that help probation, courts, families and communities have confidence that a placement is appropriate and safe.”
“California prosecutors support rehabilitation and second chances, but rehabilitation without accountability isn’t reform; it is a gamble with public safety,” said Greg Totten, CEO of the California District Attorneys Association.
According to a CBS California investigation published Aug. 20, the state does not centrally track how and where many young people are placed in these programs, or what the outcomes are. Victim families claim the state legislature has killed the safety and accountability standards needed, while the governor has ignored experts on how best to implement such standards.
“The public shouldn’t have to rely on investigative reporters to do oversight the state should already be doing,” said state Assemblymember Juan Alanis, vice chair of the Assembly Public Safety Committee. “These families deserve answers – not another year of silence.”
“When I found out the person convicted of murdering my brother had walked out of secure custody before her sentence was over, the ground fell out from under us all over again,” said Savannah Bonboster, sister of Sergio Bonboster, a foster youth who was murdered in 2021. His killer, then 17, was later released from secure custody while still serving her juvenile sentence.
“That person is walking around a college campus right now, going to class, building a future at Sacramento State [University],” continued Bonboster. “My brother never got that chance.”