LA County DA Nathan Hochman reverses predecessor’s ban on death penalty

Reversing a controversial mandate from his predecessor, Los Angeles County District Attorney Nathan J. Hochman lifted a blanket ban Tuesday barring prosecutors from seeking the death penalty for special-circumstance homicides.

The new policy, effective immediately, will be used in “exceedingly rare cases” and only after thorough review by prosecutors and consultation with crime victims, the District Attorney’s Office said in a statement.

Los Angeles County Public Defender Ricardo Garcia swiftly denounced the new policy.

“This decision is a step backward for L.A. County,” Garcia said. “The death penalty is a cruel and irreversible punishment that is racially biased and ineffective as a deterrent. The death penalty doubles down on a system that has disproportionately harmed the poor and communities of color.”

Jess Farris, senior policy counsel at the American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California, also criticized the policy.

“The issues that have driven L.A. voters to repeatedly reject the death penalty still ring true: the incompetent attorneys often defending death penalty cases in L.A. County, its legacy of discriminatory and arbitrary use, its proven failure to deter capital crimes, its tragic fallibility, and its endorsement of brutality and murder as solutions to complex problems,” Farris said in an email

Farris said she is hopeful Hochman will foster justice by “identifying, confronting and responding to the true causes of crime, rather than continuing to resurrect failed and cruel policy relics L.A. has already left behind.”

The policy reverses a controversial blanket ban against the death penalty implemented by former progressive District Attorney George Gascón, who was handily defeated for reelection by Hochman in November 2024.

“A sentence of death is never an appropriate resolution in any case,” said Gascón’s directive prohibiting prosecutors from seeking capital punishment. “The office will strive to ensure that all actions taken are consistent with this policy, including refraining from filing letters stating an intention to seek the death penalty, filing briefs, seeking discovery, or making arguments in court that indicate that the death penalty is an appropriate sentence.”

Gascón’s directive also banned prosecutors from defending the sentences of inmates already on death row and actively aimed at having them resentenced.

However, some prosecutors, crime victims and even judges pushed back.

In 2021, Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Roger Ito rejected a request from the District Attorney’s Office to remove Samuel Zamudio from death row and instead sentence him to life in prison for a 1996 double murder in South Gate.

A prosecutor argued at the time that Zamudio was intellectually disabled, exempting him from the death penalty.

Under Hochman’s new policy, defense attorneys will be offered enhanced opportunities to share information about defendants with the District Attorney Office’s Special Circumstances Committee when the death penalty is under consideration.

“I remain unwaveringly committed to the comprehensive and thorough evaluation of every special circumstance murder case prosecuted in Los Angeles County, in consultation with the murder victim’s survivors and with full input on the mitigating and aggravating factors of each case, to ensure that the punishment sought by the office is just, fair, fitting and appropriate,” Hochman said in a statement.

The death penalty, he said, “should be restricted to the most egregious sets of circumstances.”

In California, the execution chamber at San Quentin State Prison has been closed since Gov. Gavin Newsom declared a moratorium on the death penalty in 2019.

“The intentional killing of another person is wrong and, as governor, I will not oversee the execution of any individual,” Newsom said in a statement at the time.

“Our death penalty system has been, by all measures, a failure. It has discriminated against defendants who are mentally ill, black and brown, or can’t afford expensive legal representation,” Newsom said. “It has provided no public safety benefit or value as a deterrent. It has wasted billions of taxpayer dollars. Most of all, the death penalty is absolute. It’s irreversible and irreparable in the event of human error.”

City News Service contributed to this article.