Filed 12/17/20 P. v. Ayala CA2/2

NOT TO BE PUBLISHED IN THE OFFICIAL REPORTS

California Rules of Court, rule 8.1115(a), prohibits courts and parties from citing or relying on opinions 

not certified for publication or ordered published, except as specified by rule 8.1115(b). This opinion 

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IN THE COURT OF APPEAL OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA

SECOND APPELLATE DISTRICT

DIVISION TWO

THE PEOPLE,

Plaintiff and Respondent,

v.

JOEL JOE AYALA, 

Defendant and Appellant.

 B302166

 (Los Angeles County

 Super. Ct. No. A788294-01)

APPEAL from an order of the Superior Court of Los 

Angeles County, William C. Ryan, Judge. Affirmed.

Randall Conner, under appointment by the Court of 

Appeal, for Defendant and Appellant.

Xavier Becerra, Attorney General, Lance E. Winters, Chief

Assistant Attorney General, Susan Sullivan Pithey, Assistant 

Attorney General, Paul M. Roadarmel, Jr. and Allison H. Chung, 

Deputy Attorneys General, for Plaintiff and Respondent.
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* * * * * *

Joel Ayala (defendant) sought a youth offender parole 

hearing pursuant to Penal Code section 30511 for which he is 

statutorily ineligible, and the trial court denied his request. On 

appeal, he asserts for the first time that section 3051 violates 

equal protection in two different ways. We conclude it does not, 

and affirm.

FACTS AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND

I. Facts

In July 1986, defendant and a second man attempted to 

carjack a black truck and, when the truck’s owner did not comply, 

the defendant shot the owner once and the second man shot him 

twice. The owner died. Defendant was 18 years old at the time. 

II. Procedural Background

A. Prosecution, conviction and sentence

The People charged defendant with murder (§ 187, subd. 

(a)), and further alleged the special circumstance that the murder 

was committed while defendant was engaged in a robbery 

(§ 190.2, subd. (a)(17)) and that defendant had personally used a 

firearm (§ 12022.5). 

The jury found defendant guilty of first degree murder, and 

found both of the further allegations to be true. 

In light of the special circumstance finding, the trial court 

sentenced defendant to prison for life without the possibility of 

parole. 

B. Current petitions

In April 2019, defendant filed a petition for a writ of habeas 

corpus seeking a youth offender parole hearing pursuant to 

1 All further statutory references are to the Penal Code 

unless otherwise indicated.
3

section 3051 on the ground that he had been incarcerated for at

least 25 years. On August 2, 2019, defendant filed a petition 

under section 1203.01 seeking the same relief. 

The trial court denied defendant’s first petition on the 

ground that he was ineligible for a youth offender parole hearing 

under the plain terms of section 3051, and denied the second as 

successive to the first.

C. Appeal

Defendant timely filed this appeal. 

DISCUSSION

As a general matter, section 3051 grants prisoners who 

were “25 years of age or younger” at the time they committed “the 

controlling offense” the right to a “youth offender parole hearing” 

where a court will “review[]” their “suitability” for “parole.” 

(§ 3051, subd. (a).) But section 3051 does not extend this right to 

all prisoners who were 25 or younger at the time of their crimes: 

As pertinent here, section 3051 does not apply to persons 

sentenced to life without the possibility of parole (LWOP) if they 

were “18 years of age” or older at the time they committed the 

controlling offense. (Id., subd. (h); see generally In re Jenson 

(2018) 24 Cal.App.5th 266, 277-278.)2 

Defendant is not eligible for relief under section 3051, as he 

was 18 years old at the time of the murder and was sentenced to 

LWOP. Accordingly, he argues on appeal that he is entitled to a 

youth offender parole hearing because section 3051 denies his 

right to equal protection of the laws in two ways: (1) it grants a 

2 Section 3051 also does not apply to persons sentenced 

under our Three Strikes Law for recidivists (§§ 667, subds. (b)-(j), 

1170.12, subds. (a)-(d)), or our One Strike Law for violent sex 

crimes (§ 667.61). (§ 3051, subd. (h).)
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youth offender parole hearing to juveniles (that is, persons under 

the age of 18) sentenced to LWOP, but denies such a hearing to 

“youthful offenders” (that is, persons 18 to 25 years old)

sentenced to LWOP, and (2) it grants a youth offender parole 

hearing to persons convicted of first degree murder but not 

sentenced to LWOP, but denies such a hearing to persons 

convicted of murder but sentenced to LWOP. Defendant did not 

raise either equal protection challenge with the trial court, so has 

forfeited each challenge. (E.g., People v. Alexander (2010) 49 

Cal.4th 846, 880, fn. 14.) We will nevertheless exercise our 

discretion to consider his equal protection challenges. We 

independently review constitutional challenges to a statute. 

(People v. Ramos (1997) 15 Cal.4th 1133, 1154.)

The right to equal protection of the law is violated when 

“the government . . . treat[s] a [similarly situated] group of people 

unequally without some justification.” (People v. Chatman (2018) 

4 Cal.5th 277, 288 (Chatman); Manduley v. Superior Court (2002) 

27 Cal.4th 537, 568.) Where our Legislature fixes different 

punishments for different crimes, those differences do not violate 

equal protection unless the challenges show “there is no ‘rational 

relationship between the disparity of treatment and some 

legitimate governmental purpose.’” (People v. Turnage (2012) 55 

Cal.4th 62, 74 (Turnage); People v. Wilkinson (2004) 33 Cal.4th 

821, 838.) “This so-called ‘rational basis’ scrutiny is exceedingly 

deferential: A law will be upheld as long as a court can 

‘speculat[e]’ any rational reason for the resulting differential 

treatment, regardless of whether the ‘speculation has “a 

foundation in the record,”’ regardless of whether it can be 

‘empirically substantiated,’ and regardless of whether the 

Legislature ever ‘articulated’ that reason when enacting the law.” 
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(People v. Love (2020) 55 Cal.App.5th 273, 287, quoting Turnage, 

at pp. 74-75 and Johnson v. Department of Justice (2015) 60 

Cal.4th 871, 881.)

We examine each of defendant’s equal protection 

arguments separately.

I. Differential Treatment of Juveniles and Youthful 

Offenders Sentenced to LWOP

Defendant argues that section 3051 violates equal 

protection because it treats youthful offenders (that is, those 18 

to 25 years old) who commit murder and are sentenced to LWOP 

differently than juveniles (that is, those under 18 years old) who 

commit murder and are sentenced to LWOP; the former are not 

entitled to a youth offender parole hearing, while the latter are. 

Defendant’s equal protection challenge to this distinction lacks 

merit because, even if we assume that youthful offenders and 

juveniles who commit murder and are sentenced to LWOP are 

similarly situated, both the United States Supreme Court and 

our Supreme Court have repeatedly found the line drawn 

between juveniles and non-juveniles when it comes to criminal 

sentencing to be a rational one. (Miller v. Alabama (2012) 567 

U.S. 460, 471 [“children are constitutionally different from adults 

for purposes of sentencing”]; Roper v. Simmons (2005) 543 U.S. 

551, 574 (Roper) [“The age of 18 is the point where society draws 

the line for many purposes between childhood and adulthood”]; 

People v. Gamache (2010) 48 Cal.4th 347, 405 [“We previously 

have rejected the argument that a death penalty scheme that 

treats differently those who are 18 years of age and older, and 

those younger than 18, violates equal protection”].) Defendant 

nevertheless urges that the line section 3051 draws is not 

rational because all persons under the age of 25 should be 

entitled to show that they have reformed themselves while in 
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prison, but the U.S. Supreme Court has already considered and 

rejected such arguments when it has upheld the longstanding 

practice of distinguishing between juveniles and adults despite 

the fact that “[t]he qualities that distinguish juveniles from 

adults do not disappear when an individual turns 18.” (Roper, at 

p. 574.) Indeed, the court in In re Jones (2019) 42 Cal.App.5th 

477 rejected precisely the argument defendant now advances 

under a similar statute: “The Legislature could reasonably 

decide that for those convicted of LWOP crimes, the line should 

be drawn at age 18, rather than at some later date when the 

brain is fully developed.” (Id. at p. 483.) We add another brick to

this solid wall of precedent.

II. Differential Treatment of Youthful Offenders 

Convicted of First Degree Murder (But Not Sentenced To 

LWOP) And Youthful Offenders Convicted of First Degree 

Murder (But Sentenced to LWOP)

Defendant next argues that section 3051 violates equal 

protection because it treats youthful offenders convicted of first

degree murder differently than youthful offenders who are 

sentenced to LWOP; the former are entitled to a youth offender 

parole hearing, while the latter are not. Defendant’s equal 

protection argument to this distinction also lacks merit. Because 

a person is eligible for LWOP only if he has committed first

degree murder (§ 190.2), both groups involve youthful offenders 

convicted of first degree murder. But those sentenced to LWOP 

have also been found, beyond a reasonable doubt, to have 

committed that first degree murder under one of 22 different 

special circumstances that reflect that the particular first degree 

murder was in some manner aggravated or reflected a greater 

risk of harm to persons other than the immediate murder victim. 

(§ 190.2, subds. (a)(1)-(a)(22); People v. Horning (2004) 34 Cal.4th 
7

871, 907 (Horning).) As a result, youthful offenders who have 

been sentenced to LWOP have committed an aggravated form of 

first degree murder that distinguishes them from youthful 

offenders who have committed first degree murder but done so in 

the absence of any aggravating factors. Consequently, the two 

groups are not similarly situated. (In re Williams (2020) 57

Cal.App.5th 427, 435-436 (Williams) [so holding]; see also People 

v. Jacobs (1984) 157 Cal.App.3d 797, 803 [“‘Persons convicted of 

different crimes are not similarly situated for equal protection 

purposes’”], italics omitted; see also People v. Pecci (1999) 72 

Cal.App.4th 1500, 1503 [“persons convicted of different offenses 

can be punished differently”].) And even if we accept for the sake 

of argument defendant’s contention that all murderers are 

similarly situated vis-à-vis section 3051’s desire to allow all

youthful offenders the opportunity to show that they have 

reformed, the difference in the underlying crimes provides a 

rational reason for distinguishing between the two groups of first

degree murderers. (Williams, at pp. 435-436; accord, People v. 

Contreras (2018) 4 Cal.5th 349, 382 [noting that “special 

circumstance murder” is sentenced most “harshly”].)

Defendant argues that People v. Edwards (2019) 34 

Cal.App.5th 183 (Edwards) dictates a different result. It does 

not. Edwards held that our Legislature had no rational reason to 

deny a youth offender parole hearing to a juvenile convicted of 

sexually violent crimes under our One Strike Law but to grant 

such a hearing to a juvenile convicted of first degree murder 

because “no crime deserves categorically harsher punishment 

than . . . first degree murder.” (Id. at pp. 197-199.) As a 

threshold matter, at least one subsequent decision has rejected 

Edwards’s analysis, and our Supreme Court has granted review 
8

to resolve the split. (People v. Williams (2020) 47 Cal.App.5th 

475, 492, review granted July 22, 2020, S262191.) But even if we 

ignore Edwards’s uncertain status, the two groups of youthful 

offenders at issue in this case both committed first degree 

murder, rendering Edwards’s “you have it backwards” rationale 

inapt. Defendant urges that section 3051 has it backwards in 

this case because it denies a youth offender parole hearing to a 

youthful offender who commits first degree murder on a felonymurder theory (and who is sentenced to LWOP) but grants such a 

hearing to a youthful offender who commits first degree murder 

in a premeditated and deliberate manner (and who is not 

sentenced to LWOP). This is backwards, defendant explains, 

because premeditated murders are worse than felony murders. 

Defendant’s argument ignores that a first degree murder 

conviction based on a felony murder qualifies as a special 

circumstance murder only if the defendant “killed ‘to advance an 

independent felonious purpose,’” and thus killed while intending 

to commit a wholly separate felony apart from the homicide, 

which elevates his overall criminal culpability in a manner that 

was not present even with a premediated killing. (Horning, 

supra, 34 Cal.4th at p. 907.) What is more, the presence of 

“backwards” sentences in individual cases does not invalidate the 

entire distinction (e.g., In re Maston (1973) 33 Cal.App.3d 559, 

564-566 [“asymmetry in the scale of penalties” in individual 

instances does not mean the Legislature acted irrationally for 

equal protection purposes]), and is of no weight here where 

defendant was the actual killer because the evidence showed that 

(1) defendant was the one who shot the victim “in the side” and 

(2) it was the “abdominal” gunshot “wound” that was fatal. 
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DISPOSITION

The order denying post-conviction relief is affirmed.

NOT TO BE PUBLISHED IN THE OFFICIAL REPORTS.

______________________, J.

HOFFSTADT

We concur:

_________________________, P. J.

LUI

_________________________, J.

CHAVEZ