California’s 548 death row prisoners could be spared execution under Gov. Gavin Newsom’s plan, announced last week, to commute every death sentence in the state to life in prison without parole. The list includes some of the most notorious and prolific convicted killers in the state’s history. Newsom wrote in an open letter to California residents that his decision came “after nearly three decades of openly opposing state-sanctioned executions as an elected official.” Serial killers and people convicted of murdering children are among those who could be spared execution. For 382 prisoners with multiple felony convictions, commutations require review by the California Supreme Court. Here are some of the most high-profile cases. Randy Kraft: The “Scorecard Killer” In the 1970s and 1980s, computer consultant Randy Steven Kraft targeted men with military backgrounds, picking up young hitchhikers on the interstate. California Highway Patrol officers pulled Kraft over for weaving on May 14, 1983, and found a dead body in the front passenger seat. Detectives found a notebook in Kraft’s car containing more than 60 entries — a “scorecard” of his killings, prosecutors said. If each entry represented a victim, Kraft would rank among the most prolific serial killers in US history. Also known as the Southern California Strangler, Kraft was convicted of 16 murders in Orange County in May 1989, but linked to at least 29 additional slayings nationwide, according to prosecutors. Two officials in Orange County, where Kraft was prosecuted, criticized Newsom’s announcement, saying it undermined accountability for those convicted. “Newsom has spared the state’s most heinous criminals from the full accountability determined by juries of their peers, based on facts and evidence presented at trial,” Don Barnes, Sheriff-Coroner of the Orange County Sheriff’s Department, told CNN. Orange County District Attorney Todd Spitzer did not address Kraft’s case specifically but said in a statement responding to Newsom’s commutation announcement that the governor should be “ashamed of himself.” “Today, the voices of criminals are louder than the cries of victims,” Spitzer said. Michael Gargiulo: The “Hollywood Ripper” Actor Ashton Kutcher testified at Michael Gargiulo’s trial that he went to Ashley Ellerin’s home in 2001 for what was supposed to be a date night. “I thought it odd the lights were all on, I didn’t want to be the guy looking through her window,” Kutcher said, adding that the place looked a little bit of a mess. “Then I saw what I thought was red wine on the carpet.” Prosecutors later said what Kutcher saw was “actually blood.” Ellerin had been stabbed 47 times. Michael Gargiulo was convicted in August 2019 of murdering Ellerin, 22, and Maria Bruno, 32, and attempting to kill Michelle Murphy, then 26, in 2008. He was sentenced to death in July 2021. Prosecutors said Gargiulo charmed women in the Los Angeles area by presenting himself as a friendly neighbor and handyman before breaking into their homes and stabbing them to death. Gargiulo has maintained his innocence. The governor’s decision was a betrayal of victims’ families, Los Angeles County District Attorney Nathan Hochman told CNN. Prosecutors “make a promise” to victims’ families when bringing cases on their behalf, Hochman said. “If they let the justice system do its job and they don’t take justice into their own hands, that we will go ahead and basically let the facts and the law play out in a courtroom,” Hochman told CNN. Chester Turner: The “Southside Slayer” During the height of the crack cocaine epidemic in the 1980s and 1990s, Chester Turner, a father of four who worked as a pizza delivery driver, targeted women who used drugs in South Los Angeles. Turner was charged with murder in 2004 while incarcerated for rape, after detectives matched his DNA to evidence from a crime scene. Forensic testing ultimately linked him to 14 killings, including that of a pregnant woman. An intellectually disabled janitor named David Allen Jones had been wrongfully convicted and served nine years in prison for three of Turner’s slayings before he was released in 2004. Turner was convicted of 10 murders in 2007 and sentenced to death. In 2014, he was convicted of four additional murders and again sentenced to death. Turner is one of at least three men blamed for a series of killings once thought to be the work of a solo killer dubbed the “Southside Slayer,” according to the Associated Press. More than 100 women in South Los Angeles were killed during the violent, crack-fuelled era. “Each one of these cases leaves behind a victim family that thought they had some level of closure and achieved some level of justice in the system that has been violently disrupted,” Hochman said. The Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office also prosecuted Turner. Charles Ng: The Northern California cabin murders The charred and buried remains of at least 19 people were found at a remote cabin in Wilseyville, in the Sierra Nevada foothills east of San Francisco. Prosecutors said Charles Ng and his accomplice, Leonard Lake, tortured and murdered victims there in a series of sex-slavery killings in 1984 and 1985. After a four-month trial and two weeks of jury deliberations, Ng was convicted of killing six men, three women and two baby boys during the murder spree. Lake died by swallowing cyanide pills sewn into his clothes after police questioned him in June 1985. Ng fled to Canada and fought extradition for six years. Videotapes of some victims of the kidnapping and sex-slavery scheme devised by Lake and carried out with Ng’s help were played in court. Ng maintained his innocence at the trial, testifying that while he appeared on videotapes torturing and sexually abusing two female victims, he did not kill anyone. He placed the blame entirely on Lake. Calaveras County Sheriff Rachelle Whiting also expressed disappointment with the governor’s announcement. Whiting said she attended the annual Calaveras Cold Case Task Force fundraiser recently, noting that the group relies on donations for “costly forensic DNA analysis that government-funded laboratories cannot provide.” The task force remains “focused on justice for victims by identifying and restoring the names of victims” in cases such as the Wilseyville serial killings, she said. Richard Allen Davis: The murder of Polly Klaas During a slumber party with two friends in October 1993, 12-year-old Polly Klaas was abducted by an intruder who threatened the girls with a knife, tied them up and gagged them, before taking Polly from her home, according to court records. The man, later identified as Richard Allen Davis, eventually confessed and led police two months later to Klaas’ strangled body, which was buried in a shallow grave near a freeway. In 1996, three years after the killing, Davis was convicted of Klaas’ murder, as well as robbery, burglary, kidnapping, false imprisonment and attempted lewd conduct with a minor. After hearing the verdict, Davis turned to the courtroom with his shirt hanging out of his belt, and made an obscene gesture to the room. Klaas’ kidnapping horrified the nation and helped drive passage of California’s “three strikes” law on repeat offenders. The law imposed substantially longer prison sentences for people convicted of a third offense. Newsom’s announcement that he was commuting the death sentences of hundreds of prisoners, including Davis, felt like “a shiv in my back,” Polly’s father, Marc Klaas, told CNN. The Sonoma County sheriff also objected to the governor’s decision, saying it undermines the judicial process. “I strongly oppose this decision,” Sonoma County Sheriff Eddie Engram said in a statement. “I believe it undermines confidence in our judicial system and forces victims’ families to confront painful memories of crimes that forever changed their lives.”
