‘Nothing to appeal’: Judges rebuff Davis double murderer’s early release bid
State appellate judges on Wednesday pushed back against Davis double murder Daniel William Marsh’s attempt to appeal his sentence in the grisly 2013 slayings of an elderly Davis couple.
The 24-year-old Marsh was 15, just days away from his 16th birthday, when he committed the grotesque thrill killings of 87-year-old Oliver “Chip” Northup and wife, 76-year-old Claudia Maupin, in the bedroom of their south Davis condominium in April 2013.
Now, Marsh, serving a sentence of 52 years to life in a San Diego prison in the killings, is appealing his 2014 Yolo Superior Court conviction, fighting to be released as a juvenile offender in May 2022 — his 25th birthday.
Marsh is asking state appeals judges to retroactively decide whether his murder case was final when Senate Bill 1391 was passed. The 2019 law bars 14- and 15-year-olds accused of violent crimes from being tried as adults.
The three-judge state appellate panel of associate justices Cole Blease, Andrea Lynn Hoch and Louis Mauro have 90 days to render their written decision.
Marsh did not appear for the livestreamed afternoon hearing before Sacramento’s 3rd District Court of Appeal, but appellate judges Wednesday flatly disputed Marsh attorney Mark Greenberg’s argument that a 2018 Yolo Superior Court hearing to determine whether Marsh should be tried as a juvenile four years after Marsh’s 2014 murder conviction amounted to a retrial.
A Yolo judge’s ruling in 2018 upholding Marsh’s state prison sentence did not amount to a new judgment, said one of the judges.
“There’s nothing to appeal,” state Associate Justice Hoch told Greenberg. “There’s no retrial. The original judgment (was) reinstated. There was no new judgment.”
Greenberg also contended that Marsh’s window to appeal his sentence didn’t close with the 2018 Yolo ruling, saying state judges’ final ruling on the case did not come until early 2019, after SB 1391 was signed and passed into law.
Wrong, said state deputy Attorney General Rachelle A. Newcomb.
“His crimes rendered him unfit to be tried in juvenile court. There was a final date” to appeal, Newcomb argued. “That date is Aug. 21, 2018, prior to 1391 (becoming law). He’s not entitled to the benefits of that 2019 law. ... Bottom line, the decision was final in the regular timelines. The time to appeal ended in August 2018.”
Attorneys at Marsh’s appeal hearing Wednesday in Sacramento each had 15 minutes to make their case in one of the state’s most grisly crimes.
In April 2013, Marsh, armed with a hunting knife, the soles of his shoes duct-taped to avoid detection, wandered the streets of his south Davis neighborhood before slicing his way through a screen window and climbing into the couple’s condominium and making his way to their bedroom.
Marsh, once hailed a boy hero for saving his father’s life when the elder Marsh suffered a heart attack behind the wheel of the family’s car, would later tell investigators he watched Maupin and Northup sleep before setting upon them. He stabbed the pair more than 60 times each and mutilated their bodies.
Marsh said in a videotaped interview before his arrest that he was “exhilarated” by the slayings. Yolo County jurors originally convicted Marsh in 2014 after a wrenching five-week trial.
Maupin’s daughter and granddaughter, Victoria Hurd and Sarah Rice, were expected to view the brief hearing in Woodland alongside Yolo County District Attorney Jeff Reisig. The three have vehemently opposed the 2019 law and have called on state lawmakers to scrap the legislation.
Last week, Hurd and Rice joined Reisig and Yolo County crime victims at the Yolo County District Attorney’s Office in Woodland to announce a new coalition dedicated to advocating for victims of violent crime.
“Hopefully we can change this law so that it’s not blanket,” Hurd said last week. “There needs to be accountability for crimes like ours. This was one of the most gruesome crimes in California history. We shouldn’t even be here.”
Marsh returned to a Woodland courtroom in 2018 after a state appellate court sent Marsh’s case back to Yolo County juvenile court to determine whether Marsh should be retroactively tried as a juvenile or whether the case should stay in adult criminal court.
The hearing was mandated under the state’s Proposition 57 which requires judges to determine whether juveniles may be prosecuted as adults.
The Yolo judge ultimately upheld Marsh’s sentence in October 2018.
This story was originally published August 18, 2021 at 5:00 AM with the headline "‘Nothing to appeal’: Judges rebuff Davis double murderer’s early release bid."
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