The Murders of Chelsea King and Amber DuBois by John Gardner

By Dana Grimes

Gardner has admitted murdering these two girls, and he will be sentenced to life without parole. He will go to prison without being the center of attention at a trial, which a certain category of murderers seem to enjoy, and he will die in prison. His conviction and sentence provide a degree of closure for the families of the girls. There has been some controversy about his conviction in 2000– caused by hindsight– a desire by some people to blame the legal system for not locking him up longer on that case.

In July of 2000, Gardner appeared for sentencing, having pled guilty to a number of crimes arising out of beating and sexually touching a thirteen-year-old girl. It was a vicious crime, but when he committed it, Gardner was twenty years old, and had no significant criminal record. He showed sexual intent and committed sexual acts, but there was no completed rape. Under the California Penal Code and the sentencing rules by which it is applied, the most likely sentence was going to be three years, six years, or eight years. Gardner was eligible for probation. Both the probation department and the D.A.’s office strongly argued against probation, and against the low term of three years, and recommended six years in state prison. They both said that this was a brutal crime and he was a danger. Neither the upper term of eight years, or any consecutive sentences on any counts, were not likely to happen under the applicable statutes. The sentencing judge agreed with the probation department and D.A. The judge denied probation, declined to impose the low term of three years, and imposed the mid term of six years in prison. This happens to be the same sentence that is imposed as the mid term for one count of forceable rape, even though there was no rape. By the standards of the thousands of violent crimes that come through our courts, Gardner’s six year sentence was not lenient; it was consistent with other sentences. There are some sex offenders who manage to commit such a combination of offenses that they get life, or twenty years or more on their first conviction, but that is not the most common scenario for first offenders.

A lot has been made of the psychological report by Dr. Matthew Carroll for the probation department. Dr. Carroll found Gardner to be a "bad guy" who had no remorse. It is surprising that Gardner’s attorney allowed Gardner to be interviewed by the probation department or Dr. Carroll because Gardner denied committing the crimes to which he pled guilty. Psychologists invariably conclude that a criminal who denies committing the crime will not benefit from therapy, and will be at risk of committing future similar crimes. That is also what Dr. Carroll concluded. The main result of Dr. Carroll’s report was that Gardner should not get probation, and that he probably should not get the low term of three years, but it did not somehow give the sentencing judge the legal right to lock Gardner up forever.

In the relatively small number of cases where psychological evaluations are performed on defendants, judges read them carefully, but are not controlled by them. It is more common for a judge to impose a higher sentence recommended by the psychologist, rather than the lower recommendation.

Of course it would have been good if Gardner had been in prison during the time period that he murdered Chelsea King and Amber DuBois. It would have been even better if he had been hit by a bus before then, and better yet if he had been hit by a bus before his crimes of 2000, but that is also hindsight. The fact of the matter is that the criminal justice system in California is one of the toughest in the world, but it is usually not possible to predict which criminal, out of thousand, will at a future date commit crimes as horrible as those committed by Gardner.

UPDATE - October 17, 2010:

"Chelsea's Law" has been signed by the governor, and is now the law in California.  The law contains a number of provisions including mandatory life sentences for certain sex offenders and changes in parole proceedures for some offenders.

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