Man implicated in Ontario killing released at sentencing
RANCHO CUCAMONGA -- A man involved in a 2002 killing in Ontario was released from custody last week at the conclusion of a sentencing hearing in West Valley Superior Court.
Cesar Guzman, 47, was sentenced on Oct. 19 to six years in state prison as part of a plea bargain reached with prosecutors for his role in the Oct. 30, 2002 shooting death of Craig Corle, 38.
Guzman was released at the end of last week's hearing because the time he spent in custody, with behavior credits included, equaled six years.
At a 2007 preliminary hearing, Guzman testified that he and an accomplice, Kent Craig, hired a hitman to beat up Corle for failing to repay Guzman $100 and failing to return speakers he borrowed from Corle.
Without consulting Guzman, Craig reportedly altered the plan and told the hitman -- a teenage drug dealer from San Bernardino -- to kill Corle.
Guzman pleaded no contest to voluntary manslaughter for his role in Corle's death. Craig was convicted of murder by jury last year and sentenced to 26 years to life in prison.
It doesn't seem like justice: sentenced in killing an innocent man---and then let go, by the court, as a free man. But, on closer examination, it truly is the correct sentence. The man, who changed the original plan, was justly convicted and properly sentenced.
My concern is this: how do we get judges and/or sentencing courts---that did not administer justice because of mistakes, ignorance, and willful misconduct and corruption---to correct what they had done, and free innocent and much-too-harshly-punished-people in prison?
Corle was the defendant in a harassment case of a young woman in 2000. He was issued a restraining order. Sounds like he was a troubled guy.