People v. Williams CA2/5

I. INTRODUCTION

Defendant and appellant Jenelle Williams and her co- defendant David Bean were each charged with four murders occurring at different locations within a time span of two weeks in the summer of 2016. The same gun was used in all four murders. Other crimes and enhancements related to the same incidents, as well as priors, were also alleged. Williams and Bean were tried together by the same jury in 2023, after Williams’s two motions to sever were denied. Williams was convicted of second degree malice murder, first degree felony murder, and first degree malice murder, with various enhancements and special circumstances found true. She was acquitted of the remaining murder charge and an assault charge was dismissed after the jury hung and the court declared a mistrial as to that count. She was also convicted of three counts of being a felon in possession of a firearm. She admitted her single prior strike and serious felony conviction. Williams was sentenced to two consecutive terms of life without parole for two of the murders, plus an indeterminate and aggregate term of 55 years to life for the third, plus an additional aggregate determinate term of six years and…