Three men appeared at a sentencing hearing Monday and will face prison time for the 2013 beating and subsequent death of a Santa Barbara-area homeless man.
Jonathan Andrade, 21, Roman Romero, 19, and Carlos Medina, 45, appeared in Santa Barbara Superior Court on Monday for sentencing, after they pleaded guilty in January to voluntary manslaughter.
The charges stem from an assault on Richard Boden Jr. during the early morning hours of Sept. 16, 2013, when witnesses stated that Andrade, Romero and Medina were drinking alcohol with Boden and several others in an area known as Granny’s Field behind the Turnpike Shopping Center.
The motive for the attack was unclear, and all parties were intoxicated, according to a statement from the Santa Barbara County District Attorney’s Office.
Others present in Granny’s Field carried Boden to the street behind Vons and Boden was transported to the hospital, where he remained unresponsive for more than a month.
He was later removed from life support, and on Oct. 14, 2013, Boden died from complications related to his injuries sustained during the assault.
All three of the defendants had been initially charged with second-degree murder, but “due to the state of the admissible evidence that would be available at trial, the parties reached a plea bargain wherein the defendants acknowledged their roles in the death of Mr. Boden and pled guilty to voluntary manslaughter,” the District Attorney’s Office statement said.
Andrade was sentenced Monday to six years in state prison and Romero to three years in state prison. Medina is expected to be sentenced on April 28 to six years in state prison.
“The District Attorney’s Office would like to commend the Santa Barbara Sheriff’s Office for their thorough investigation of this incident and to thank the family of Richard Boden Jr. for their patience and endurance throughout this extraordinarily painful process,” the statement said.
— Noozhawk staff writer Lara Cooper can be reached at lcooper@noozhawk.com. Follow Noozhawk on Twitter: @noozhawk, @NoozhawkNews and @NoozhawkBiz. Connect with Noozhawk on Facebook.
