SAN JOSE — A Santa Clara County choose on Friday rejected a proposed settlement between prosecutors and convicted assassin Erik Chatman that may have given parole eligibility to the person who as soon as confronted the loss of life penalty for viciously stabbing Rosellina LoBue at a San Jose picture kiosk in 1987.
The deal was meant to resolve habeas corpus and Racial Justice Act petitions Chatman filed this 12 months, alleging his trial was stricken by racial bias and misconduct.
Whereas neither facet disputed that Chatman killed LoBue — together with his toddler son in tow — prosecutors moved to settle the case by petitioning the Superior Court docket to drop a particular circumstance allegation of torture Chatman was convicted of in 1993. Underneath the settlement, Chatman, who was taken off loss of life row final 12 months as a part of a landmark resentencing initiative by District Legal professional Jeff Rosen, would have been resentenced to 25-years-to-life and made parole eligible.
LoBue’s surviving siblings balked on the proposal, saying they had been assured final 12 months by Rosen that taking Chatman off loss of life row would nonetheless finish with him dying in jail. After a Friday court docket listening to, through which Decide Eric Geffon stated approving the settlement exceeded his authority below a 2022 legislation change, Tony LoBue and his sister Marie audibly exhaled.
“We feel that finally, the wheels of justice are starting to turn in our favor,” Tony LoBue stated exterior the courtroom. “I know this isn’t over. We will be fighting every step of the way.”
Chatman, now 60 and held in a state jail close to Sacramento, filed petitions earlier this 12 months — unrelated to his earlier resentencing — alleging that his authorized protection was stricken by ineffective counsel, trial misconduct and racial bias; Chatman is half Black. The district legal professional’s workplace settlement proposal sought to move off the challenges and dangers of doubtless re-trying Chatman, together with having to depend on almost 40-year-old investigative information and the sensible impact that the passing of 4 many years has on witness availability.
Deputy District Legal professional Alexandra Gadeberg advised Geffon how the homicide trial was rife with allusions to racial “stereotypes and tropes” that would arguably have appealed to the all-white jury’s racial prejudices, and will have substantiated violations below the Racial Justice Act of 2020. The South Bay-originated legislation presents authorized reduction for provable bias in arrests, convictions and sentences, and retroactively applies as a result of Chatman’s case is taken into account lively in mild of his appeals.
Chatman’s petitions particularly focused repeated references at trial about his crack cocaine habit, together with claims that the $500 he took from the money register after stabbing LoBue 51 occasions at a Picture Drive-Up close to downtown San Jose was spent on shopping for extra of the drug to make use of together with his spouse and mother-in-law.
A violation of the RJA, Gadeberg additional argued, would vacate the whole conviction — and the settlement preserved the first-degree homicide conviction.
“There is pending litigation that that has raised colorable claims that the Racial Justice Act may have been violated during the trial in the early ’90s,” Gadeberg stated in an interview earlier than the choice Friday. “Based on the possible risks that come with all litigation, we are electing to resolve the pending litigation by way of a legal stipulation with defense counsel.”
Even when Chatman had been granted parole eligibility below the deal, Gadeberg famous that his freedom was no positive factor since he nonetheless must show to a parole board that he had rehabilitated to some extent the place he was longer a public hazard. James McManis, a longtime South Bay legal professional who appeared in court docket on behalf of the LoBue household, argued that Chatman would have finally been freed if Geffon authorized the settlement.
Chatman admitted to stabbing Rosellina LoBue, who was 18 and labored together with his then-wife at a Picture Drive-Up in San Jose, on Oct. 7, 1987, reportedly after a strained dialog about his private life. She was stabbed 51 occasions; authorities stated Chatman’s two-and-half-year-old son was available when the lethal assault occurred.
Chatman was arrested in 1990 in Houston after being linked to the killing. Later trial testimony established that after the killing, Chatman was seen again house in East Palo Alto together with his younger son in a bath, each of them washing off blood from their our bodies.
Earlier than and at Friday’s listening to, McManis argued that the district legal professional’s workplace didn’t have the authorized or “interest of justice” grounds to additional change Chatman’s sentence.
Geffon in the end sided with McManis and the LoBue household, however cited completely different authorized reasoning, contending that what the prosecution and Chatman’s attorneys had been asking for was basically a pre-conviction plea deal that was mismatched with the present post-conviction standing of the case. He added that the racial bias claims had been nonetheless unproven allegations and granting the petition can be an “extraordinary” use of his energy.
“The request to recall the defendant and sentence is denied,” Geffon concluded.
After the listening to, McManis stated the choose “listened very carefully, heard all the parties and I think made the correct decision.”
The district legal professional’s workplace additionally addressed the ruling, saying in an announcement, “The court’s ruling today provides an alternative path for our office to achieve justice by preserving the defendant’s first-degree murder conviction and keeping him in prison where he has remained for the last 35 years.”
Chatman was faraway from loss of life row final 12 months as a part of a coverage initiative by Rosen to resentence Santa Clara County’s condemned males to life-without-parole phrases. The coverage was borne from Rosen’s willpower that the loss of life penalty was unjust and that pursuing loss of life penalty instances was impractical given a state moratorium on capital punishment and the literal dismantling of the bodily loss of life row at at San Quentin State Jail.
Eleven males had been resentenced below the initiative, whereas a handful declined Rosen’s resentencing supply with a purpose to protect their appellate rights. One man, Richard Wade Farley, was denied resentencing reduction after a choose decided he had not expressed regret or proven enough rehabilitation following his conviction for the notorious 1988 ESL mass taking pictures in Sunnyvale.
Tony LoBue, his sister Marie, and different teams of surviving family and family members galvanized over their opposition to Rosen and their need to depart the loss of life sentences undisturbed.
“If he thinks we’re stopping here, we’re going to keep going,” Tony LoBue stated. “We’re going to keep fighting him with everything we have … and we’re not the only ones.”
