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    Senior Member CnCP Legend CharlesMartel's Avatar
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    Cervantes, Sawyer and Sawyer Sentenced to 15 Years to Life in 2017 CA Slaying of John Haig Marshall


    John Haig Marshall


    Myles Sawyer, Taylor Cervantes, Tyler Stark, Brandon Sawyer


    4 men charged with murdering Redondo Beach sex offender

    By Larry Altman
    The Beach Reporter

    Four South Bay men were charged Friday with killing and robbing a registered sex offender, strangling him and attacking him with pliers and bolt cutters when he got out of his shower in his Redondo Beach apartment.

    The charges make them eligible for the death penalty.

    The victim, John Haig Marshall, 61, died Nov,. 28, five years after he was sent to prison for drugging a young male friend, shaving his body hair and sexually assaulting him in that same shower area amid allegations he had molested more than a dozen other victims since the 1970s.

    Whether the homicide was linked to Marshall’s sordid past was unclear. A complaint filed at the Torrance courthouse Friday alleges the men committed a home invasion robbery, taking two cellphones, two briefcases, a VHS video camera and Marshall’s passport. The cellphones were pawned at a shop in Compton.

    Court appearances

    The alleged killers — Taylor John Cervantes, 22, of Hawthorne; Tyler Lee Stark, 24, of Torrance; Myles Jorge Sawyer, 25, of Torrance; and his brother, Brandon Scott Takeo Sawyer, 23, of Torrance — made appearances together Friday in Torrance court, but their arraignment was postponed until Jan. 30.

    Judge Thomas Sokolov ordered them held in county jail without bail.

    Each was charged with felony counts of murder, conspiracy to commit burglary, first-degree burglary with a person present, and home-invasion robbery. The District Attorney’s Office also filed special circumstances allegations that the murder was committed during the commission of a robbery and a burglary, and an allegation that bolt cutters were used as a deadly and dangerous weapon.

    Prosecutors will later decide if they will seek the death penalty or life in prison without the chance of parole.

    Redondo Beach police officials declined comment Friday, referring questions to the District Attorney’s Office.

    Relationship unknown

    Coroner’s officials said Marshall died from neck compression and blunt head trauma.

    Marshall’s relationship to his alleged killers was not disclosed, but Marshall was known in the past to enjoy the company of young men and teenage boys.

    According to the criminal complaint filed in court, Stark, Cervantes, and the Sawyer brothers met in Torrance and drove in Stark’s car to a Home Depot in Torrance, where they purchased the Channellock pliers and bolt cutters and drove to Marshall’s apartment in the 300 block of North Catalina Avenue. Marshall owned and managed the building, and lived in one of the units.

    Cervantes and the Sawyer brothers, wearing dark clothing, put on gloves and covered their faces with bandannas, the complaint said. After Brandon Sawyer used the pliers to break the lock on Marshall’s door, the three entered. Cervantes walked into the bathroom, strangled Marshall with his hands when he exited the shower, and Cervantes, Brandon Sawyer and Myles Sawyer assaulted and killed Marshall using the pliers and bolt cutter, the document said..

    After taking Marshall’s property, Stark drove the group to his home in Torrance. Stark and Brandon Sawyer later pawned Marshall’s cellphones.

    Redondo Beach police arrested the men earlier this week, jail records show. The records also showed the men had previous contacts with South Bay law enforcement.

    Victim’s crimes

    Marshall also was well known to the Redondo Beach Police Department. Officers arrested him on Oct. 8, 2009, when a 29-year-old man sought medical treatment, telling doctors he had been drugged and raped. The man feared he had contracted a sexually transmitted disease. Doctors reported the crime to police.

    According to a police spokesman at the time, the man told officers he and Marshall knew each other and drank together on several occasions. He went to Marshall’s apartment a few days earlier to work on his computer. After Marshall provided him with an alcoholic drink, he became incapacitated and found himself in Marshall’s shower, alert but unable to respond to what was happening to him. Prosecutors at the time said Marshall sexually assaulted the man with a thin, hard object and shaved his body hair. The man later awakened on the sofa and left the apartment.

    The Daily Breeze reported at the time that police detectives were already investigating sexual assault allegations previously made against Marshall, who had served as a police reserve officer for nine months from 1980 to 1981, when he resigned for unknown reasons. The allegations included reports that Marshall had drugged an underage boy and engaged in sex with him over an extended period in 2000. Prosecutors declined to file charges because the allegations were made beyond the statute of limitations for the offenses.

    In 2005 and 2006, police staked out Marshall’s apartment building when callers reported on law enforcement tip lines that high school boys were going to Marshall’s apartment and coming out “stoned.” The callers said Marshall provided teens with Quaaludes, cocaine, methamphetamine, marijuana, and alcohol, police said. Detectives were unable to corroborate the tips.

    Facing eight years in prison on several charges, Marshall agreed to a plea deal with prosecutors in Torrance Superior Court that sent him away for three years. Marshall, the son of the late Alese Marshall, who operated a modeling and talent agency in Torrance, pleaded no contest to a charge of sexual penetration of an intoxicated person and was ordered to register as a sex offender upon his release.

    Marshall’s attorney on the case said Marshall feared likely testimony during the case about allegations that he drugged and molested teen boys as far back as the 1970s. Police said 14 people had contacted detectives following Marshall’s arrest.

    http://tbrnews.com/news/redondo_beac...9e1d55ba4.html
    Last edited by CharlesMartel; 01-31-2018 at 07:41 AM. Reason: add photo of convicts

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