Carson man gets death for killing elderly couple

From the District Attorney:

NORWALK -- A Norwalk judge sentenced a 34-year-old Carson man to death today for stabbing an elderly couple to death during a robbery in their Cerritos home nearly six years ago.

Before sentencing, Norwalk Superior Court Judge Dewey L. Falcone first denied a defense motion to reduce the jury's recommendation of death for Anthony Deondrea Cain to life in prison without the possibility of parole, said Deputy District Attorney June Chung. She prosecuted the case with DDA Islam Ramadan.

The jury returned the death verdict in November. The same jury earlier convicted Cain, who was related to the couple through marriage, of first-degree murder of Ernestine and Lamar Matthews in the couple's home the 12900 block of Oak Crest Street. The jury also found true the special circumstances of murder during a robbery and multiple murders.

The couple, both 75, had planned to travel on a fund-raising trip to an Indian casino near San Diego on the Feb. 11 morning in 2004 when their bodies were discovered. Ernestine Matthews, a former teacher in the Compton Unified School District, and her husband, a retired parole officer, also were preparing to celebrate their 50^th wedding anniversary later that year.