Dead Presidents defendants sentenced to death
SAN BERNARDINO - Two men recently convicted of killing four men and wounding two others in the so-called "Dead Presidents" slayings in San Bernardino were sentenced today to death by lethal injection.
Defendants Luis Alonzo Mendoza and Lorenzo Inez Arias were sentenced in conjuction with a jury's findings during a several week trial in San Bernardino Superior Court. Judge Michael A. Smith ordered the pair to be transported to San Quentin State Prison.
Mendoza, 32, and Arias, 29, were part of a four-person armed group that fired gunshots at fellow gang members outside a duplex on West Vine Street, in San Bernardino, in July 2000.
Prosecutors say Mendoza sought control of a gang and had targeted one of the victims for providing information to police. The defense contends the men were not "the worst of the worst" and not deserving of the death penalty.
The victims who died in the shooting were: 33-year-old Johnny Agudo, his brother Gilbert Agudo, 27; Anthony Daniel Luna, 23; and Luna's half-brother, Marselino Gregory Luna, 19. Of the four men, two were presidents of local street gangs, prompting some in law enforcement circles to dub the case "Dead Presidents."
A jury convicted Mendoza and Arias of all the charges on July 8 and found true the special circumstances which carried the death penalty on Aug. 13.
Another defendant in the case, John Adrian Ramirez, 34, took a plea bargain in the case. A fourth man, Froylan Chiprez, 33, remains a fugitive.
Leave a comment