A jury deliberated less than two hours Wednesday to return with guilty verdicts in the case of a Compton teenager accused of killing the mother and stepfather of his girlfriend in 2011. Giovanni Gallardo, now 18, was found guilty of firstdegree murder for plotting and murdering Gloria Villalta, 58, and Jose Lara, 51, while his girlfriend, Cynthia Alvarez, looked on. Both charges also carried special allegations of lying in wait and multiple murders.
Gallardo, who was tried as an adult, faces life in prison. He is scheduled to be sentenced July 31.
What the jury had to decide was whether Gallardo freely confessed, as the prosecution contended, or whether he was improperly led to confess by detectives who took advantage of his developmental disability, as the defense argued.
Earlier this month, Alavarez, 16, was convicted after four hours of deliberation of two counts of firstdegree murder and special allegations connected with the killings.
It took Gallardo’s jury half the time to reach the same decision.
Gallardo strangled Villalta and beat Lara with a baseball bat and stabbed him with Alvarez’s help.
In his closing argument, Deputy District Attorney Eric Siddall described Gallardo by saying: “This is a person who has no shame.”
“You have heard in great detail how this man plotted with his girlfriend Cynthia Alvarez for weeks,” Siddall said. “They coordinated and orchestrated the murder of (Villalta and Lara).”
The prosecution’s case was built largely on a statement Gallardo gave when questioned by police.
In that statement, which jurors saw on tape, Gallardo attempted to absolve Alvarez, although he admitted she took part in the killings.
Los Angeles County Deputy Alternate Public Defender Scott Johnson argued the interrogation of Gallardo was “botched” by the detectives, who believed Alvarez when she told them that Gallardo killed the parents.
With that, he said detectives used leading questions to get Gallardo to implicate himself.
He also argued Gallardo was easily steered because he has an IQ of 57, which experts described as mild to moderate mental retardation, and is illiterate.
“(Detectives) got what they wanted, but I don’t think they got the truth,” Johnson said.
Johnson said there were discrepancies in Gallardo’s testimony and contradictions with physical evidence, including how many times Gallardo claimed to stab Lara, the placement of wounds and other details.
Johnson said Gallardo was clearly involved with the disposal of the bodies, but was only an accomplice after the fact.
Siddall in his closing said the level and detail of Gallardo’s statement proved his participation throughout and referenced quotes from a transcript in which Gallardo talked about the planning that went into the attack and items he brought with him to commit the alleged crime.
Siddall also argued that the defense’s own witness described Gallardo’s limitations in a way that showed he could not have concocted the elaborate false confession that Johnson suggested.
Despite Gallardo’s low IQ score, the defense did not argue Gallardo’s competence to stand trial.
The murders of Villalta and Lara, whose bodies were discovered in shallow graves in Norwalk and North Long Beach, respectively, drew considerable attention.
The crimes were notable for their brutality, the alleged assailants’ ages and their subsequent behavior in the wake of the killings.
Both admitted to driving around with the dead mother’s decomposing body in the trunk for days after her death while buying supplies, planning and decorating for a Halloween party.
In Alvarez’s trial, she claimed killing the parents was Gallardo’s idea, although she did nothing to stop him.
John Nash Law Blog 