Judge orders release of prisoner sentenced to potential life term for stealing church food

Judge frees thief sentenced to potential life term

LOS ANGELES — A judge on Monday ordered the release of a man serving a potential life sentence for stealing food from a Los Angeles church.

Gregory Taylor, 47, wept as family members and supporters erupted in applause after the judge amended his sentence to eight years already served. He was taken back into custody and will be released after his paperwork is completed, a process expected to take at least two days.

He thanked the court for “giving me another chance … and my family for sticking by me.” The judge asked the bailiff to get Taylor a tissue.

The Stanford Law Project filed a writ of habeas corpus seeking freedom for Taylor, who was sentenced in 1997 under California’s three-strikes law. The district attorney did not oppose the group’s move.

“I thought I was going to cry, too,” said Stanford Law School student Reiko Rogozen, who worked on the case. “He was scared up until the last minute that it wasn’t actually going to happen.”

Taylor was arrested 13 years ago while trying to pry open a screen above the kitchen door at St. Joseph’s Church.

He was convicted of third-strike burglary due to convictions of robbery twice in the 1980s, once for stealing a purse containing $10 and once for trying — unarmed — to rob a man on the street.

A priest testified Taylor was often given food and allowed to sleep at the church. Taylor’s attorney contended the crime was at most misdemeanor trespassing because Taylor thought he had the right to take food, but Superior Court Judge James Dunn refused to let him present that argument to the jury.

The 2nd District Court of Appeal upheld Dunn’s decision, questioning whether a “claim of right” defense could ever be valid and saying Taylor could not have honestly believed he had the right to break into the church. The state Supreme Court ordered the lower court to reconsider the conviction and life sentence.

A dissenting justice compared Taylor to a 20th-century version of a character from Victor Hugo’s novel “Les Miserables.”

In the meantime, the high court ruled in a separate case that people accused of theft can be acquitted if they persuade a jury they had a good-faith belief that they had the right to possess the property they took.

When running for office in 2000, District Attorney Steve Cooley often used Taylor’s case to describe how unfair he believed the three-strikes law was. He said if the third strike wasn’t serious and wasn’t violent, three strikes should not apply.

Taylor’s 78-year-old mother, Lois, said after the hearing that she hadn’t seen him in 13 years, “but he’s the same Greg.”

In a telephone call before the hearing, Taylor asked her for a home-cooked meal, so Lois Taylor said they would have a big barbecue.

Angela Taylor, his sister, remembered the day he called and told her about the sentence.

“I thought he was lying. Twenty-five to life? That’s crazy,” she said.

Taylor was imprisoned at the California Men’s Colony in San Luis Obispo.

The Rev. Alan McCoy, who testified for Taylor at his sentencing, died two years ago, Mrs. Taylor said.

“If he was living now, it would be the most beautiful thing,” she said.

Taylor got his GED in prison.

“Even in conversations over the phone he sounded way more mature,” his sister said.

He plans to live with a younger brother, Michael Taylor, who runs a food pantry in Pomona.

Michael Taylor said he and some other brothers were planning a West Coast cruise and if Taylor gets out before Aug. 23, they’ll take him along.

Cooley has a policy of not asking for third-strike sentences for nonviolent crimes, but other prosecutors don’t share that policy, Stanford law school student Gabriel Martinez said.

The Stanford Three Strikes Project has lost two cases recently — one for a man who stole a pair of socks and another for a man convicted of having 0.1 grams of methamphetamine, he said.

“We’ll celebrate this case for certain, but there’s a lot of work to be done to reform the three-strikes law,” Martinez said.