People v. Cervantes CA2/5, B330271M

Ruben Cervantes was convicted by a jury in 1999 of two counts of first-degree murder and five counts of attempted murder, all related to a gang conflict when he was 23 years old.
He was sentenced to life without parole (LWOP), with special circumstances found true, including committing multiple murders, gang enhancements, and use of a firearm.
In 2023, Cervantes sought a hearing to preserve evidence for a future youth offender parole hearing under Penal Code section 1203.01, following the rationale of People v. Franklin and In re Cook.
The trial court denied the motion, concluding that youth offender parole hearings do not apply to offenders serving LWOP for crimes committed after age 18, under Penal Code section 3051(h).
On appeal, Cervantes argued that this exclusion violates the constitutional right to equal protection and constitutes cruel and unusual punishment under the California Constitution.

Issue	Cervantes's Argument	People's Argument	Held
Exclusion from youth offender parole hearing (Equal Protection)	Excluding LWOP offenders aged 18–25 from parole hearings is arbitrary	Legislature acted rationally in drawing this line; precedent supports	No equal protection violation (Hardin is controlling)
LWOP sentence for 23-year-old is cruel/unusual punishment	His youth makes LWOP grossly disproportionate, regardless of conduct	Circumstances and nature of crimes must be considered; sentence fit	Sentence not cruel/unusual given facts and law

People v. Franklin, 63 Cal.4th 261 (Cal. 2016) (sets procedures for youth offender parole hearings)
In re Cook, 7 Cal.5th 439 (Cal. 2019) (clarifies retroactive application of Franklin procedures)
People v. Hardin, 15 Cal.5th 834 (Cal. 2024) (section 3051 does not violate equal protection by excluding certain LWOP offenders)
In re Lynch, 8 Cal.3d 410 (Cal. 1972) (sets out three-factor test for cruel and unusual punishment review)