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Thread: James Michael Fayed - California Death Row

  1. #11
    Administrator Heidi's Avatar
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    Death Penalty for Man Who Ordered Wife's Murder

    Los Angeles - A man who co-owned a gold trading company was sentenced to death today for masterminding his estranged wife's murder in a Century City parking garage just over three years ago during an acrimonious divorce battle.

    Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Kathleen Kennedy rejected a defense motion for a new trial for James M. Fayed, 48, along with an automatic motion to reduce the jury's recommendation of a death sentence to life in prison without the possibility of parole.

    Jurors deliberated just over three days before recommending on May 31 that Fayed be executed for the fatal ambush of Pamela Fayed, who was stabbed 13 times as she approached her SUV in a parking garage at Watt Tower in Century City on July 28, 2008.

    The same jury earlier convicted Fayed of first-degree murder and conspiracy to commit murder, and found true the special circumstance allegations of murder for financial gain and murder while lying in wait.

    Kennedy called the slaying a "cold-blooded, vicious and brutal murder."

    She noted that Fayed was nearby as his wife was being "brutally and brazenly" murdered, and that others reacted to the victim's "blood-curdling screams."

    "That is one cold, calculated human being, Mr. James Fayed -- doesn't feel anything," the judge said.

    Kennedy added that surveillance video showed Fayed outside the parking garage "totally immune to the screams of his wife, the mother of his child."

    "He did nothing to warn her, to protect her, to call off the dogs, so to speak," the judge said.Three other men charged in Pamela Fayed's killing are awaiting trial separately.

    The alleged killer, Steven Vicente Simmons, 23; the alleged getaway driver, Jose Luis Moya, 51; and the alleged lookout, Gabriel Jay Marquez, 46; each face life in prison without the possibility of parole if convicted. Moya worked as a ranch hand for Fayed at his Ventura County ranch.

    The Fayeds were in the midst of a bitter divorce. The killing occurred just after the two met with their criminal attorneys as a result of a federal investigation into the couple's gold-trading business.

    Based on a taped confession to a jailhouse informant, prosecutors contended that Fayed contracted the hit on his estranged wife because he believed the mother of two would cooperate with federal investigators and because she could have ended up with half of the couple's marital assets in a divorce.

    Prosecutors also alleged that Fayed planned to arrange more killings from behind bars in hopes of eliminating the people who committed the crime for him.

    The judge said that the evidence and facts in the case were "gruesome and horrible," and that she was "convinced that the charges have been proved beyond a reasonable doubt."

    One of Fayed's attorneys, Mark Werksman, said his client has maintained his innocence throughout the case and that he believed Fayed had been "denied a fair trial." He unsuccessfully asked the judge to spare Fayed's life, saying a man who once had dozens of employees and "millions of dollars in gold reserves" is now indigent and has lived through "the most oppressive incarceration that one can endure" with 23 and a half hours a day in lockdown.

    The judge responded, "That's a hell of his own making and there are consequences for actions."

    Another defense attorney, Steve Meister, told the judge that Fayed would be "last in line" to be executed after others including "Night Stalker" Richard Ramirez, who was sentenced to death in 1989. He said it wouldn't do any good for Pamela Fayed's family to have to wait through decades of appeals.

    While Meister noted that his client was "not the actual killer," the judge said there was "nothing mitigating about the fact the defendant hired others to do his dirty work."

    "... His greed was seemingly the controlling factor in why and how this murder was carried out," Kennedy said.

    The victim's sister-in-law, Renee Goudie, said Fayed has left a difficult road for his 12-year-old daughter, whom she is raising with Pamela Fayed's older brother, Scott. She told the judge that she has been confronted by other children asking if the girl's mother is dead and if her father is in jail when she picks up the girl, Jeanette, at school.

    Scott Goudie told the judge that the family will spend the rest of their lives "picking up the pieces" and trying to move on.

    Outside court, he said the death sentence brings "partial closure to this situation."

    "There are still three more defendants we have to go through (trial)," Scott Goudie said, telling reporters that he thinks the sentence was "fair" for a man who "orchestrated the murder of another human being."

    Fayed's conviction and death sentence will be automatically appealed to the California Supreme Court.

    "We're going to continue to press the issues that we think are critical in Mr. Fayed's case. We're going to seek a just outcome which in this case would be for a new trial," Werksman told reporters outside court.

    He noted that his client was "resigned to this outcome today" and has known for months that it was likely he would be sentenced to death.

    "He's a little bit shocked, though, and he's facing an uncertain future on death row, and he's upset and depressed, as I think you'd expect anyone to be under these circumstances," the defense attorney said. "Mr. Fayed maintains that he had not intended to or attempted to kill his wife."

    http://www.myfoxla.com/dpp/news/loca...#ixzz1e3hBJNDZ

  2. #12
    Administrator Moh's Avatar
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    Fayed's direct appeal has been fully briefed before the California Supreme Court since October 30, 2015.

    https://appellatecases.courtinfo.ca....lTUCAgCg%3D%3D

  3. #13
    Senior Member CnCP Addict johncocacola's Avatar
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    For being sentenced in 2011 having the direct appeal fully briefed only 4 years later is quite fast by California standards.

  4. #14
    Administrator Moh's Avatar
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    I think it's because, due to his wealth, he was able to retain his own attorney rather than having to wait around to have one appointed for him.

  5. #15
    Senior Member CnCP Addict johncocacola's Avatar
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    Scott Peterson is doing the same thing and like you said on his page Moh that by having a private attorney he might actually be hurting himself more than helping.

  6. #16
    Senior Member Frequent Poster Fact's Avatar
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    There is no better way to avoid execution than to have a woefully deficient trial lawyer. Peterson is screwed because he hired one of the best criminal defense lawyers in the country to handle his trial. Peterson called 39 witnesses in mitigation over the course of more than a week.

    He basically has to count on juror or prosecutorial misconduct.

    On the other hand, the really good appellate attorneys are masters at creating delays in both state and federal court. These guys have an advantage in terms of that.
    Last edited by Fact; 11-08-2015 at 04:35 PM.

  7. #17
    Administrator Moh's Avatar
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    On March 3, 2016, Fayed filed a habeas petition in Federal District Court.

    https://dockets.justia.com/docket/ca...cv01482/641573

  8. #18
    Senior Member CnCP Legend Mike's Avatar
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    Nearly $10 Million Returned to Victims of Fraud Run By Man Now on Death Row

    NBC Los Angeles

    Federal prosecutors said this week they have returned $9.8 million to roughly 1,000 victims who invested with e-Bullion.com, an e-currency business once operated by a man convicted of arranging his wife's murder in Century City.

    According to the U.S. Attorney's Office, the website operated for years as an illegal money-transmitting business.

    The $9.8 million -- the final civil proceeds recovered in the case -- were disbursed Wednesday pursuant to a civil forfeiture judgment from gold and silver stored at a mint in Perth, Australia.

    The funds had been stored there by James Fayed and his companies -- e-Bullion.com, Goldfinger Coin and Bullion and Goldfinger Bullion Reserve Corp.

    This week's disbursement in the e-Bullion civil forfeiture cases follows previous disbursements of $1.8 million in civilly forfeited funds to more than 300 victims in December 2014, and about $12 million disbursed to more than 1,000 victims in November 2015.

    Fayed was arrested in 2008 on charges that he paid a former employee to orchestrate the slaying of his wife, Pamela Fayed, in a Century City parking garage.

    He was convicted of first-degree murder and conspiracy in May 2011 in Los Angeles and sentenced to death.

    According to federal prosecutors, authorities obtained information from e-Bullion's and GCB's encrypted computer servers in Switzerland.

    That information was used to identify e-Bullion account holders and the value of their individual accounts.

    https://www.nbclosangeles.com/news/l...508862961.html
    "There is a point in the history of a society when it becomes so pathologically soft and tender that among other things it sides even with those who harm it, criminals, and does this quite seriously and honestly. Punishing somehow seems unfair to it, and it is certain that imagining ‘punishment’ and ‘being supposed to punish’ hurts it, arouses fear in it." Friedrich Nietzsche

  9. #19
    Administrator Moh's Avatar
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    On January 7, 2020, oral argument will be heard in Fayed's direct appeal before the California Supreme Court.

    https://www.courts.ca.gov/documents/SJAN720A.pdf

  10. #20
    Administrator Helen's Avatar
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    California Supreme Court upholds murder conviction of gold trader

    The California Supreme Court has upheld the murder conviction of the former owner of a gold-trading firm who argued there were errors in his original death penalty trial.

    James Michael Fayed, 57, was found guilty in 2011 of 1st-degree murder and conspiracy to commit murder in the 2008 death of his estranged wife, Pamela Fayed, 44.

    3 men paid by James Fayed stabbed her to death in the parking garage of a Century City, Calif., office building. She had just left her lawyer's office.

    The Fayeds ran 2 companies together -- Goldfinger Coin and Bullion Sales -- and a related online gold-trading company, E-Bullion. A judge had been scheduled to hear arguments on Pamela Fayed's request to have the business treated as a separate entity in their divorce because she feared her husband was trying to conceal assets.

    Both were under investigation for allegedly laundering money for Ponzi schemes through their e-currency business.

    The three men who carried out the slaying were also convicted in Pamela Fayed's death.

    James Fayed's lawyers sought to have his murder conviction overturned on multiple grounds, including that a secretly recorded conversation he had while in jail on different charges shouldn't have been admitted as evidence. He said the recording violated his Sixth Amendment right to counsel.

    The court on Tuesday refused the argument, saying the right to counsel is only applicable after a defendant is charged.

    Though James Fayed was sentenced to death, that punishment was put on hold in March 2019 after California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed an indefinite moratorium on capital punishment in the state.

    (source: United Press International)
    "I realize this may sound harsh, but as a father and former lawman, I really don't care if it's by lethal injection, by the electric chair, firing squad, hanging, the guillotine or being fed to the lions."
    - Oklahoma Rep. Mike Christian

    "There are some people who just do not deserve to live,"
    - Rev. Richard Hawke

    “There are lots of extremely smug and self-satisfied people in what would be deemed lower down in society, who also deserve to be pulled up. In a proper free society, you should be allowed to make jokes about absolutely anything.”
    - Rowan Atkinson

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