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Thread: Benjamin Bernal Cota - Arizona Death Row

  1. #1
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    Benjamin Bernal Cota - Arizona Death Row




    Summary of Offense:

    Convicted and sentended to death for the December 2003 murders of Victor Martinez and Guadalupe Zavala, a Peoria couple who had hired him to remodel their house. Prosecutors believe Cota killed Martinez, 73, by beating him on the head with a baseball bat or hammer. Then, they think Cota lay in wait for Zavala, 40, to come home from work. He stabbed her, bound her hands and feet, wrapped her face in duct tape, and struck her repeatedly in the head and face with a machete or meat cleaver, prosecutors said. Cota lived in the house for the next week, according to trial testimony. He forged checks on the couple's bank account and took the title to one of their vehicles, which Cota gave to his son.

    Cota was sentenced to death on August 14, 2009.

  2. #2
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    August 14, 2009

    Man sentenced to death in 2003 murder of Peoria woman


    By Michael Kiefer
    The Arizona Republic

    A Maricopa County Superior Court jury on Friday sentenced a Tolleson man to death for the brutal December 2003 murder of a Peoria woman. But the jury could not choose between life or death as punishment for killing the woman's husband.

    Last month, Benjamin Cota, 47, was found guilty of murdering Victor Martinez and Guadalupe Zavala, a Peoria couple who had hired him to remodel their house.

    Prosecutors believe Cota killed Martinez, 73, by beating him on the head with a baseball bat or hammer. Then, they think Cota lay in wait for Zavala, 40, to come home from work. He stabbed her, bound her hands and feet, wrapped her face in duct tape, and struck her repeatedly in the head and face with a machete or meat cleaver, prosecutors said.
    Cota lived in the house for the next week, according to trial testimony. He forged checks on the couple's bank account and took the title to one of their vehicles, which Cota gave to his son.

    When the victims' friends and family members called the house, Cota would say the two had left for Mexico or Texas.

    Police searched the house and found nothing. Then Martinez' son found the bodies wrapped in plastic in the couple's bedroom. Police arrested Cota after a traffic chase in which he crashed one of the couple's trucks.

    On July 15, after a three-month trial, he was found guilty of two counts of first-degree murder, two counts of armed robbery, possession of narcotics and fleeing police.

    But the jury could only reach a unanimous decision for the death penalty for Zavala's murder. The County Attorney's Office has the option of asking for a new penalty trial for Martinez' murder, or it can drop its intent to seek the death penalty and enter into a plea agreement as to whether Cota receives natural life in prison or life with a chance of parole after 25 years for the second killing.

    Cota also must be sentenced on the other charges at a later date.

    Martinez's son Julian said that he is satisfied with the jury's verdict.

    "That's fine, that's the way they think, but they got one for Lupe," he said. "All I can say is that justice has been served."

    "My dad always said that today is a better day than yesterday. He's going to rest in peace now."

    http://www.azcentral.com/news/articl...4cota0815.html

  3. #3
    Senior Member CnCP Legend JLR's Avatar
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    Arguments scheduled for the 24th of January 2012.

    http://www.azcourts.gov/Portals/21/O...%201_24_12.pdf

  4. #4
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    State v. Cota

    A jury found Benjamin Cota guilty of two counts of first-degree murder, two counts of armed robbery, one count of possession of narcotics, and one count of unlawful flight. Cota was sentenced to death on one first-degree murder count and to prison terms for the other counts. The trial judge stated that he believed Arizona law "required" him to make the sentences on the "non-capital" counts consecutive, and he did so on all but the flight count. The Supreme Court affirmed Cota's convictions and death sentence but remanded for resentencing on the non-capital counts, holding that although the judge here imposed one concurrent sentence, the Court was not convinced the judge was aware of his discretion to do the same with all other sentences under Ariz. Rev. Stat. 13-708.
    An uninformed opponent is a dangerous opponent.

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    Administrator Heidi's Avatar
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    In today's United States Supreme Court orders, Cota's petition for writ of certiorari was DENIED.
    An uninformed opponent is a dangerous opponent.

    "Y'all be makin shit up" ~ Markeith Loyd

  6. #6
    Administrator Moh's Avatar
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    On October 3, 2016, Cota filed a habeas petition in Federal District Court.

    https://dockets.justia.com/docket/ar...v03356/1001978

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