A Moorpark, California, father who pleaded guilty to felony incest after having sex with his 18-year-old biological daughter received just one year in county jail, a sentence handed down by a judge appointed by Governor Gavin Newsom, even though prosecutors asked for the maximum three-year state prison term. The daughter, Makayla Rene Settles, died by suicide five months after the assault. Now her mother is calling on Newsom to overhaul the state's sex crime statutes.
Stephen Vincent Chavez, 41, plied Makayla with alcohol before the encounter in July 2025, the New York Post reported. He pleaded guilty to felony incest and furnishing alcohol to a minor. In addition to the one-year jail sentence and three years' probation, Chavez must register as a sex offender for 20 years.
Carolina Sandoval, Makayla's 40-year-old mother, told the Post she considers the outcome a failure at every level of California's justice system, from the charges filed to the sentence imposed.
"It is ridiculous. It's not justice."
Sandoval said she plans to push for legislation in her daughter's name. She wants Newsom to personally review the case and identify where the system broke down.
The judge who imposed the lighter sentence was Dusty Kawai, a registered Democrat whom Newsom appointed to the bench in 2024, Breitbart reported. Prosecutors in the Ventura County District Attorney's Office had asked for the maximum three-year state prison term. The judge's reasoning for rejecting that request has not been made public.
Deputy District Attorney Tessa McCarty stated after sentencing:
"Chavez exploited his position as a father, violated his daughter's trust, supplied her with alcohol, and engaged in criminal conduct that forever altered the course of her life."
McCarty added: "While we respect the court's decision, we continue to believe a state prison sentence was warranted under the facts of this case."
Judge Kawai has drawn scrutiny before. Breitbart noted that Kawai also recently reduced a recommended sentence by two years for a driver who killed two people while speeding at 108 miles per hour. The pattern raises a straightforward question about the kind of judges Newsom is placing on California benches, and the consequences for victims and their families when those judges exercise discretion.
The Ventura County DA's Office did not file a rape charge. Chief Deputy District Attorney Erin Meister told the Post that the evidence for a potential rape charge had been "peer reviewed by legal experts from another county, all of whom arrived at the conclusion that incest was the only felony charge supported by the facts, the law, and the evidence."
Sandoval disputes that characterization. She said Makayla gave detectives multiple statements, including a recorded video interview. There was also an audio recording of Makayla telling her cousin what happened.
"They even have an audio recording of Makayla telling her cousin what happened. You can hear the heartbreak in her voice. They had all this information, but they said it wasn't enough."
Makayla had moved from North Carolina to Moorpark, roughly 40 miles northwest of Los Angeles, to live with her biological father. Five months after the July 2025 assault, she took her own life. Sandoval said prosecutors then told her that Makayla's evidence was "no longer valid."
That claim deserves scrutiny. If a victim's recorded statements and video interviews become worthless upon her death, the system creates a perverse incentive: the worst outcomes for victims yield the lightest consequences for offenders. Newsom's administration has not been known for transparency when uncomfortable facts surface, and this case fits the pattern.
Neama Rahmani, a former federal prosecutor and president of the Los Angeles-based West Coast Trial Lawyers, offered a blunt assessment of the outcome.
"Dead women tell no tales, and unfortunately, Chavez unjustly benefited from his daughter's tragic suicide."
Rahmani said that without Makayla alive to testify and establish lack of consent, the DA's office concluded it could not prove rape. He called the result "a miscarriage of justice" that "sends the wrong message to other perpetrators of incest and sex abuse."
Chavez himself insisted the encounter was consensual, a claim about a sexual act between a father and his own daughter, one he had supplied with alcohol. The Ventura County DA's Office stated that Chavez admitted abusing a position of trust and acknowledged that Makayla was particularly vulnerable. Those admissions sit uneasily beside a one-year jail sentence.
Sandoval is not simply grieving. She is making a specific political demand: that Newsom review California's sex crime laws and act. She told the Post she wants legislation passed in Makayla Rene Settles' name.
"I'm going to fight to change these laws because no other family should have to go through what we've gone through."
She also pointed to what she described as a broader pattern of families harmed by Chavez. Sandoval said other victims of sexual abuse attended Chavez's court hearings and criticized Newsom's role.
"They let me know this is just how he is. If anything, what happened with Makayla proves all of them right. It makes sense why everybody's so angry."
Newsom's office responded with a statement that read like boilerplate. "The suggestion that Governor Newsom does not take sexual assault seriously is simply false," a spokesperson told the Post. The office cited the governor's record of signing legislation, investing in survivor services, and expanding resources to prevent sexual violence. It also said it could not comment on decisions made by local law enforcement or courts.
That last line is the tell. Newsom appointed the judge. Newsom sets the legislative agenda. Newsom signs or vetoes the bills that define sentencing ranges. Saying he cannot comment on "local" decisions is a dodge. The governor who never hesitates to weigh in on Supreme Court rulings or national culture-war fights suddenly has nothing to say about a case in his own state where a father who admitted to incest walked away with a year in county jail.
Sandoval put it plainly:
"Something has to change. It feels like they cater to the predator more than the victim."
She also described the chilling effect the outcome will have on other victims.
"It's exactly why women don't speak out. They relive everything over and over, only for the end result to come out like this. It's a slap in the face."
The facts of this case are not ambiguous. A father supplied his teenage daughter with alcohol. He had sex with her. He admitted to abusing his position of trust. She recorded her account for detectives. She told her cousin. And then she killed herself. The man who did this to her will spend one year in a county jail, not a state prison, and walk out.
Newsom has spent years cultivating a national profile built on progressive values and the claim that California leads the country on issues of justice and equity. His wife's nonprofit work and the scrutiny it has attracted suggest the family is no stranger to controversy. But this case tests something more fundamental than political branding. It tests whether the system Newsom oversees, the judges he appoints, the laws he signs, the priorities he sets, actually protects the people it claims to serve.
Sandoval said she wants the governor to look at the entire case.
"I would love for him to take the time to look at the entire case and see what went wrong and where changes can happen for other victims."
That is not an unreasonable request from a mother who buried her daughter. Whether Newsom treats it as one will say more about his priorities than any press release from his office ever could. The governor who has faced persistent questions about his political maneuvering now faces a question that has nothing to do with ambition and everything to do with governance.
When a father can admit to incest, acknowledge exploiting his own daughter's vulnerability, and receive less time than some Californians get for property crimes, the system is not protecting victims. It is managing them. And a governor who appointed the sentencing judge, controls the legislative calendar, and claims credit for every progressive milestone in the state does not get to wash his hands of the result.
Makayla Rene Settles left behind recordings, statements, and a grieving mother willing to fight. The least California can do is listen.
