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Thread: Carlos Martinez - California Death Row

  1. #1
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    Carlos Martinez - California Death Row




    Summary of Offense:

    Sentenced to death in Orange County on August 21, 2009 for the December 29, 2004 slayings of Nicolas Casas, 83, and his wife, Emilia Casas, 73. Nicolas Casas was stabbed 25 times with a steak knife during the brutal attack. Deputy District Attorney Ebrahim Baytieh argued that Casas tried desperately to save his wife of 55 years, but his age and infirmities prevented him from overcoming his much-younger assailant. Emilia Casas, too, put up a fight as she was being stabbed 35 to 40 times.

  2. #2
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    August 21, 2009

    Burglar gets death penalty for murdering couple, 83 and 73

    By LARRY WELBORN
    The Orange County Register

    SANTA ANA – A convicted burglar showed no emotion this morning as a Superior Court judge told him he should be executed for slashing a couple to death in their home nearly five years ago.

    Carlos Martinez, 34, who was convicted last year of two counts of first-degree murder for the December 2004 slayings of Nicolas Casas, 83, and his wife, Emilia Casas, 73, made no comment before Superior Court Judge William R. Froeberg handed down the maximum penalty.

    Relatives and friends of the murdered couple, including daughters Elva Morin and Emma Lozano, hugged each other in the courtroom gallery and cried.

    An Orange County jury convicted Martinez last year of committing multiple murders during the commission of a burglary, special circumstances that qualified him for a possible death sentence. But the first penalty phase ended with an 11-1 hung jury in favor of death, setting the stage for second trial this year. The second jury voted unanimously for death on July 1.

    Nicolas Casas was stabbed 25 times with a steak knife during the brutal attack on Dec. 29, 2004. Deputy District Attorney Ebrahim Baytieh argued that Casas tried desperately to save his wife of 55 years, but his age and infirmities prevented him from overcoming his much-younger assailant.

    Emilia Casas, too, put up a fight as she was being stabbed 35 to 40 times, Baytieh said.

    The couple was in the process of selling the home they had lived in since 1969 to move to Riverside to be closer to daughter Elva Morin and her family when they were killed. Martinez gained entrance in their house by pretending to be a prospective buyer, Baytieh contended.

    Shortly after he was inside, one of the victims' daughters called her parents, who told her they were excited to have someone there who was asking about buying the home, according to testimony.

    But after that phone call, Martinez used steak knives from the kitchen to mount a frenzied attack on the couple before he ransacked their home looking for money and valuables.

    Lozano found her parents' bodies in the living room with walls covered in blood when she went to check on them a short time after the phone call.

    The slayings went unsolved for nearly a year until the Orange County sheriff's crime lab matched Martinez's DNA to genetic material found on a Pepsi can left at the crime scene. His DNA was in a Department of Justice database because of a 1995 theft conviction.

    He was the first suspect to be arrested for murder in California under voter-enacted Proposition 69, which requires all convicted felons to provide a DNA sample.

    http://www.ocregister.com/articles/c...convicted-home

  3. #3
    Senior Member CnCP Legend JLR's Avatar
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    Counsel was appointed to represent Martinez on direct appeal on December 11, 2013.

    http://appellatecases.courtinfo.ca.g...doc_no=S175720

  4. #4
    Administrator Moh's Avatar
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    Martinez's direct appeal has been fully briefed before the California Supreme Court since March 8, 2017.

    http://appellatecases.courtinfo.ca.g...doc_no=S175720

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