Gov. Gavin Newsom’s executive order Wednesday to grant a temporary reprieve to California’s 737 Death Row inmates includes eight men convicted of murder and sentenced to die in Santa Barbara County.
Most have been on Death Row for decades, with the longest — Malcolm Joseph Robbins — sentenced to be executed in 1983.
The most recent addition to Death Row from Santa Barbara County is Joshua Martin Miracle, an Eastside Santa Barbara gang member who stabbed a rival gang member to death in 2004.
Newsom signed an executive order imposing a moratorium on executions, withdrawing California’s lethal injection protocols, and immediately closing the execution chamber at San Quentin State Prison.
“The intentional killing of another person is wrong and as governor, I will not oversee the execution of any individual,” Newsom said in his order. “Our death penalty system has been, by all measures, a failure.
“It has discriminated against defendants who are mentally ill, black and brown, or can’t afford expensive legal representation. It has provided no public safety benefit or value as a deterrent. It has wasted billions of taxpayer dollars. Most of all, the death penalty is absolute. It’s irreversible and irreparable in the event of human error.”
Newsom further asserted that “the death penalty is unevenly and unfairly applied to people of color, people with mental disabilities, and people who cannot afford costly legal representation. More than six in ten people on California’s death row are people of color.”
Santa Barbara County District Attorney Joyce Dudley issued the following statement regarding the governor’s action:
“I received a call from the governor’s law enforcement liaison yesterday. He notified me of the governor’s decision. I appreciated receiving that call so that I could ask additional questions. I understand that it is within the governor’s purview to decide to no longer sign death warrants, and within my purview to continue to decide when to file special circumstance murder charges where the defendant is death eligible.
“For now, this decision only applies to this governor, at this time. Therefore we will continue to follow our usual process and protocol as it relates to special circumstance murder prosecutions.”
Since Dudley became district attorney in 2010, her office has only pursued the death penalty once — in the current triple-murder case against Pierre Haobsh, who is accused in the 2016 slayings of Dr. Weidong “Henry” Han, 57; his wife, Huijie “Jennie” Yu, 29; and their 5-year-old daughter, Emily Han.
Haobsh’s trial is not expected to take place until the middle of this year.
Here, in order of how long they have been on Death Row, are the men (there are no women) sentenced to die in Santa Barbara County.
Malcolm Joseph Robbins, 59:
On Death Row 35 years, five months.
Robbins was 21 years old when he murdered Christopher Finney, 6, on June 15, 1980.
Christopher disappeared on the way home from his father’s store in Isla Vista. His skeletal remains were found about three months later near the UCSB lagoon.
Robbins confessed to sodomizing, strangling and killing Christopher, who the medical examiner determined died of a broken neck. Robbins was suspected in other killings of boys across the country.
His death sentence has been affirmed by the courts.
Conrad Zapien, 73:
On Death Row 31 years, 11 months.
Zapien, a Lompoc gang member, was 39 years old on May 19, 1984, when he killed Ruby Gonzales in front of her children to avenge a family grudge.
His death sentence has been affirmed by the courts.
Richard Allen Benson, 71:
On Death Row 31 years, 10 months.
Benson, 38 at the time, was convicted of murdering Laura Camargo and her three young children — Sterling, 23 months, Shawna, 3, and Stephanie, 4, in their Nipomo home on Jan. 5, 1986.
He also molested the two young girls over a two-day period before beating them to death.
The trial was moved to Santa Barbara County from San Luis Obispo County due to pretrial publicity.
His death sentence has been affirmed by the courts.
Theodore Wrest, 53:
On Death Row 30 years, five months.
Wrest was 21 years old the evening of March 6, 1987, when he committed a brutal string of attacks within a few blocks on the streets of Santa Barbara that left two women dead and a third permanently paralyzed.
Wrest stabbed to death Nancy Croom, 47, and Virginia Aceves, 55, and severely injured Kimi Marie Hansel, 22.
Additional charges against Wrest included robbery, rape and multiple homicides.
He also was implicated in earlier attacks on women.
His death sentence has been affirmed by the courts.
Martin Mendoza, 56:
On Death Row 21 years, two months.
Mendoza was 33 years old on Jan. 25, 1996, when he murdered his two stepchildren and a niece — Sandra Resendes, Eric Resendes, and Wendy Cervantes. He was also convicted of the attempted murders of his brother-in-law and nephew and two sheriff’s deputies, but the jury deadlocked on a charge that he attempted to murder his son.
The killings occurred in San Bernardino County, but the trial was moved to Santa Barbara County due to pretrial publicity.
His death sentence has been affirmed by the courts.
Tommy Jesse Martinez, 41:
On Death Row 20 years, five months.
Martinez was 19 years old on Nov. 15, 1996, when he raped, robbed and murdered Sophia Castro Torres, 35, at a baseball field at Oakley Park in Santa Maria.
In addition to the murder of Torres, Martinez was convicted in attacks on three other women.
Ryan James Hoyt, 39:
On Death Row 16 years, one month.
Hoyt was 21 years old when he murdered Nicholas Markowitz on Aug. 8, 2000, in the mountains above Santa Barbara.
Hoyt was an associate of Jesse James Hollywood, who had kidnapped Markowitz to use him as leverage in trying to collect a drug debt from Markowitz’s half brother.
On orders from Hollywood, Hoyt shot Markowitz to death and buried him in a shallow grave near Lizard’s Mouth.
The killing was the subject of the film Alpha Dog.
Hollywood was convicted of murder in Markowitz’s death, and sentenced to life in prison without possibility of parole.
Joshua Martin Miracle, 40:
On Death Row 13 years, one month.
Miracle, an Eastside Santa Barbara gang member, was 26 years old on Oct. 3, 2004, when he killed opposing gang member Elias Silva by stabbing him 48 times at an apartment in Goleta.
— Noozhawk executive editor Tom Bolton can be reached at tbolton@noozhawk.com. Follow Noozhawk on Twitter: @noozhawk, @NoozhawkNews and @NoozhawkBiz. Connect with Noozhawk on Facebook.