A Fresno County judge has yet to hand down a sentence for Cassandra Michael, who was convicted this month of murder in the killing of a Clovis teen, but she will serve her time at the Fresno County Juvenile Justice Center, a deputy chief confirmed Wednesday.
Michael was convicted Monday of murder with an enhancement because the crime involved a gun. The now-18-year-old and her boyfriend, Byron Rangel, were both 16 when investigators say they planned the killing of Caleb Quick, who was 18 when he was gunned down in a parking lot near Nees and Willow avenues on April 23, 2025.
Rangel is accused of being the gunman who shot Quick at close range, and he is expected to begin his own transfer hearing — where a judge will determine if his case will be transferred out of the juvenile system — and trial in the coming months.
Michael faces four to seven years in custody, or up until she turns 25. Fresno County Superior Court Judge Brian Alvarez, who convicted her, set a hearing around her sentencing for Sept. 2.
Regardless of her sentence, she will do her time at the Fresno County facility, Probation Department Deputy Chief Kayatana Davis confirmed.
The last youthful offender left the state’s Department of Juvenile Justice on June 30, 2023. Gov. Gavin Newsom signed Senate Bill 823 in 2020, prohibiting counties from sending any more juveniles into the long-troubled DJJ midway through 2021.
So Michael will remain at the Fresno County campus throughout her sentence, and a number of programs and options will open up for her that have not been available before being sentenced, Davis said. The state’s juvenile systems have a greater focus on rehabilitation and less on punishment.
“She will have more enhanced and potentially court-ordered programming that any youth can do,” Davis told The Bee. “So not just for her, but any youth may have a substance abuse counseling order, may have anger management, may have some type of cognitive behavioral intervention specifically that’s ordered in addition to what we offer.”
SB 823 also calls for counties to use the “least restrictive appropriate environment.” Davis said that means a judge could rule Michael can be placed on an ankle monitor, but she stressed that option would be “way down the line. After they have served quite a percentage of their committed baseline term.”
Welfare and Institutions Code section 875 in California also allows for a youthful offender to undergo a review every six months. A judge takes the recommendations of a team that reviews the conduct of the offender, which includes a probation officer, social worker and other staffers. The judge can use those findings to determine if the youthful offender can have time shaved off the end of their sentence.
Advocates for the move away from a focus on punishment for youthful offenders point to the state’s history of violence and neglect in the facilities.
The families of many victims of serious crimes of youthful offenders often push back against the evolving ideas that a young person’s brain has not developed completely until the age of 25. They argue the offenders receive a light sentence, have no record when they leave custody and may be a threat to re-offend.
Among those critics is Stephen Quick, the father of the teen Michael was convicted of killing. He said he was glad the judge found Michael guilty, but he stopped short of celebrating.
Quick said he believes Michael should have been sentenced to 25 years to life, the sentence she would have faced if she had been tried as an adult. He criticized the state’s system that could allow for as much as 180 days, or six months, to be trimmed from her sentence if she meets the requirements.
“I mean, it’s a good win, but I feel like she’ll be out in 2028. I just got this feeling,” he said outside the courthouse on Monday. “I have to come back in six months for probation for her, and then she has an opportunity to remove 180 days from her sentencing, and that happens every six months going until she’s out.”
Cassandra Michael, 18, enters Department 50 of the Fresno County Courthouse on Wednesday, Aug. 5, 2026, on the third day of trial. She’s accused of the murder of Caleb Quick from April 2025, when she was 16. THADDEUS MILLER tmiller@fresnobee.com 
Stephen Quick wore a pin of himself and his son, Caleb, on Monday, Aug. 17, 2026, the same day the girl accused of murdering his son was found guilty. The photo was from a Los Angeles Rams game at SoFi Stadium from December 2024, months before Caleb was murdered in Clovis. THADDEUS MILLER tmiller@fresnobee.com
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Reporter Thaddeus Miller has covered cities in the central San Joaquin Valley since 2010, writing about everything from breaking news to government and police accountability. A native of Fresno, he joined The Fresno Bee in 2019 after time in Merced and Los Banos.