Legal Question in Criminal Law in California

Re: can a person get a life sentence for this crime

I'm not sure what you mean when you say no public defenders were in court and that only assistants were there instead. Each county has only one individual whose title is public defender. He or she generally supervises a large team of lawyers; in some jurisdictions they are called deputy public defenders and in others they are called assistant public defenders. They are lawyers who represent clients of the public defenders' office. When people talk about being represented by a public defender, these are the folks they're talking about. The actual public defender is not likely to show up in court for your husband or to represent him personally.

Public defenders are dedicated lawyers and are generally as good as prosecutors. The problem with being represented by one is that they are overworked and cannot give each case as much time as the case should get. If you can afford a private attorney you may or may not get one who is more skilled than the average PD, but you almost surely *will* get one with more time to put into the case. This means you will probably also get more thorough representation.

If you can't afford a private attorney, though, you have few options. Representation which is less than thorough by a PD is much better than no representation at all, and it seems that is the way you will have to go.

Should your husband provide DNA? That's for him to discuss with his attorney -- whether privately retained or a PD. He should not make any decisions like this on his own.