“We thought we had found justice,” said Ivan’s older sister, Ibette Miranda, who attended the trials of the two defendants. Both were sentenced to terms of up to life in prison.
But on New Year’s Eve of 2020, the family learned a San Francisco judge had ordered the younger of the two gang members, Marlon Rivera, who was 16 at the time of the crime, freed.
Superior Court Judge Harold Kahn granted Rivera’s petition filed under the state’s 2019 revised felony murder rule. The new rule gives those convicted of felony murder a chance to show they were not major participants in the underlying crimes used to charge them.