Filed 7/29/24 P. v. Stewart CA2/1

NOT TO BE PUBLISHED IN THE OFFICIAL REPORTS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 

has not been certified for publication or ordered published for purposes of rule 8.1115.

IN THE COURT OF APPEAL OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA

SECOND APPELLATE DISTRICT

DIVISION ONE

THE PEOPLE,

Plaintiff and Respondent,

v.

DENNIS LEONARD STEWART,

Defendant and Appellant.

 B330762

 (Los Angeles County

 Super. Ct. No. A037377)

APPEAL from an order of the Superior Court of Los 

Angeles County, Judith L. Meyer, Judge. Affirmed.

William L. Heyman, under appointment by the Court of 

Appeal, for Defendant and Appellant.

Rob Bonta, Attorney General, Lance E. Winters, Chief 

Assistant Attorney General, Susan Sullivan Pithey, Assistant 

Attorney General, Noah P. Hill and Nima Razfar, Deputy 

Attorneys General, for Plaintiff and Respondent.

__________________________
2

MEMORANDUM OPINION1

In 1989, following trial, a jury convicted defendant Dennis 

Leonard Stewart of special circumstances murder (Pen. Code,

2

§§ 187, subd. (a), 190.2, subd. (a)(17)), premeditated attempted 

murder (§§ 187, subd. (a), 664), and residential robbery (§ 211). 

The trial court sentenced him to life without the possibility of 

parole (LWOP). After a direct appeal, we affirmed his conviction 

and sentence. (People v. Brookins et al. (Jan. 26, 1994, B056728)

[nonpub. opn.].)

In 2022, Stewart filed a motion requesting a hearing

pursuant to People v. Franklin (2016) 63 Cal.4th 261 to preserve 

evidence in anticipation of a future youthful offender3 parole 

hearing under section 3051. Stewart asserted he was 24 years 

old at the time of his offenses. The court denied the motion, 

finding Stewart ineligible for such a hearing due to his LWOP 

sentence.

Stewart now appeals, contending the court erroneously 

denied his Franklin motion because section 3051 violates two 

constitutional principles: the guarantee of equal protection, and 

the prohibition against cruel and/or unusual punishment.

Stewart’s equal protection argument has two facets. The 

first is that section 3051 denies equal protection because there is 

1 See California Standards of Judicial Administration

section 8.1(1).

2 All unspecified statutory references are to the Penal Code.

3 We refer to those over 18 years of age but younger than 

26 at the time of their offense conduct as youthful offenders, and 

to those under 18 years of age at the time of their offense conduct 

as juveniles.
3

no rational basis to deny a youthful offender with an LWOP 

sentence a parole hearing when other youthful offenders receive 

one. Our Supreme Court’s decision in People v. Hardin (2024) 15 

Cal.5th 834, which was issued while Stewart’s appeal was 

pending, forecloses this contention. Hardin held that “section 

3051’s exclusion of young adult offenders sentenced to [LWOP] is 

[not] constitutionally invalid under a rational basis standard, 

either on its face or as applied to . . . individuals who are serving 

[LWOP] sentences for special circumstance murder.” (Id. at 

p. 839.)

Stewart’s second equal protection argument is that section 

3051 lacks a rational basis for distinguishing between juveniles 

sentenced to LWOP, who are eligible for a parole hearing (§ 3051, 

subd. (b)(4)), and youthful offenders sentenced to LWOP, who are 

not eligible for such a hearing (id., subd. (h)). Stewart identifies 

no court that had agreed with this claim. Instead, the courts to

consider this argument have rejected it, and we agree with their 

analysis. (E.g., People v. Sands (2021) 70 Cal.App.5th 193, 202-

205; In re Murray (2021) 68 Cal.App.5th 456, 463-465; People v. 

Morales (2021) 67 Cal.App.5th 326, 345-349; cf. also In re Jones

(2019) 42 Cal.App.5th 477, 481 [“LWOP offenders who were 

between the ages of 18 and 25 when they committed their 

offenses are adult offenders [and] they are not similarly situated 

to juvenile offenders”].)

Stewart lastly claims that section 3051’s extension of 

youthful offender parole hearings to most but not all youthful 

offenders renders his LWOP sentence cruel or unusual. Prior 

courts have uniformly rejected the argument that LWOP 

sentences imposed on adults between the ages of 18 and 25 

violate the protections afforded by the United States and 
4

California constitutions against cruel and/or unusual 

punishment. (E.g., People v. Acosta (2021) 60 Cal.App.5th 769, 

781-782; People v. Windfield (2021) 59 Cal.App.5th 496, 525-527; 

People v. Montelongo (2020) 55 Cal.App.5th 1016, 1030-1032; 

People v. Abundio (2013) 221 Cal.App.4th 1211, 1220-1221.)

Stewart notes that other than Abundio, which was decided 

before section 3051 was enacted, these cases addressed only the 

Eighth Amendment, which prohibits cruel and unusual 

punishment, and not the parallel provision in article I, section 17

of the California Constitution, which prohibits cruel or unusual 

punishment. He fails to provide any cogent argument, however, 

why this distinction makes any difference. Both the federal and 

state constitutional prohibitions on cruel and/or unusual 

punishment typically run in tandem. (See People v. Marshall

(1990) 50 Cal.3d 907, 938 [the California Constitution 

“ ‘separately and independently lays down the same prohibition’ ”

as the Eighth Amendment].) Our Supreme Court recently

reaffirmed that it does not violate either federal or state 

constitutional prohibitions on cruel and/or unusual punishment 

to sentence youthful offenders who commit a special circumstance 

murder to the death penalty (People v. Tran (2022) 13 Cal.5th 

1169, 1234-1235), such that the lesser sentence of LWOP for 

special circumstances murder is necessarily constitutional.
5

DISPOSITION

The trial court’s order is affirmed.

NOT TO BE PUBLISHED

WEINGART, J.

We concur:

ROTHSCHILD, P. J.

BENDIX, J.