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Thread: Richard Lonnie Booker - California Death Row

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    Richard Lonnie Booker - California Death Row




    Summary of Offense:

    Sentenced to death in Riverside County on November 22, 1999 for the murders of two girls and a young mother in a Riverside apartment he set on fire with the mother's baby inside. The seven-month-old boy was saved when firefighters discovered the bodies of Tricia Powalka, 19, Amanda Elliott, 15, and Corina Gandara, 12, inside the smoke-filled apartment on the morning of August 10, 1995. All three had been stabbed and slashed and Elliott had also been shot.

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    Administrator Heidi's Avatar
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    RIVERSIDE COUNTY: Murder death penalty upheld

    The California Supreme Court upheld the conviction and death sentence today for a man found guilty of killing two girls and a young woman in a Riverside apartment he later set on fire.

    Richard Lonnie Booker, now 33, had confessed to slashing the throats of cousins Amanda Elliott, 15, and Corina Gandara, 12, and their friend, Tricia Powalka, 19, on Aug. 10, 1995, in a Riverside apartment he set on fire.

    Booker also was found guilty of attempting to murder Powalka's baby, who was covered with bloody pillows in his crib and rescued by firefighters from the smoke-filled apartment.

    The high court's 7-0 decision dismissed Booker's challenges, which included disputes on jury selection, the trial judge's admission of bloody crime scene photos, insufficient evidence, and Booker's claim that the slayings were second-degree murder.

    "A vicious, vicious crime," Riverside County Chief Deputy District Attorney Mike Soccio, who prosecuted the 1999 trial, recalled Thursday. Powalka had been stabbed 54 times.

    The attorney who argued Booker's case before the court, Jonathan P. Milberg, did not immediately return a phone call.

    The cousins were visiting Powalka for a party. Booker joined as a friend of their friend, Deverick Maddox, who testified he slept through the multiple slayings.

    Maddox said he saw the slain victims, fled from the apartment before the fire, but did not call police. Maddox was taken into custody after he was identified by others who lived in the apartment building.

    Booker did not testify during his trial, but jurors heard a tape-recording of his statement to police in which he provided information only the killer would know.

    Soccio recalled the session.

    "He was crying and rocking in his seat when we started the interrogation," Soccio said. "He started moaning and saying, 'Oh, they are going to kill me.' " Soccio said they had not yet questioned him about the slayings.

    "The detective asked, 'What are you talking about?' Then he said, 'I am going to be executed.' His first concern was not for the girls, but for himself. ... I never saw any remorse or regret for the young girls he butchered."

    http://www.pe.com/localnews/stories/...1.417e214.html


    Opinion here

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    Administrator Heidi's Avatar
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    In today's United States Supreme Court orders, Booker's petition for a writ of certiorari and motion for leave to proceed in forma pauperis was DENIED.

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    Administrator Moh's Avatar
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    On October 5, 2011, Booker filed a habeas petition before the California Supreme Court.

    http://appellatecases.courtinfo.ca.g...doc_no=S196994

  5. #5
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    Booker's habeas case has been fully briefed before the California Supreme Court since April 12, 2016.

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

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