Conviction overturned in 2006 gang attack outside Pasadena apartment building – Pasadena Star News

Jarmon Sanford, who was sentenced to 89 years to life in prison for attempted murder in a 2006 gangland shooting in Pasadena, may be home for Christmas.

Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge William C. Ryan overturned one of two attempted murder convictions against Sanford because of a flaw in the prosecution’s jury instructions.

Sanford, who was 19 when he was sentenced in 2008, is scheduled to be sentenced again on Nov. 20. His lawyers hope he will be sentenced to prison on the remaining attempted murder charge, meaning he could be released from the California Institute for a year. Men in Chino during vacation time.

The Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Sanford was convicted of firing a semiautomatic weapon from a passing car at two rival gang members standing outside a Pasadena apartment complex in December 2006. One of the men, Trevell Thompson, had been shot in the leg.

The key to the conviction was the prosecution’s abuse of the “kill zone” legal theory. The prosecution argued that Sanford could be charged with attempting to kill everyone in the area, regardless of whether he intended to kill them. Sanford’s attorney, Annee Della Donna, said under that argument there is no need to prove intent, so standard assault with a gun is elevated to a crime punishable by life in prison.

Della Donna argued to the Supreme Court that the “kill zone” theory was overly broad and misapplied in the Sanford case.

In 2019, the state Supreme Court ruled in People v. In the Canizales case, he held that the theory required that the shooter intended to kill a specific person in the kill zone and was willing to kill everyone else in the area to achieve that goal.

In Sanford’s case, there was no evidence that he intended to kill the gang rival who was not shot, Ryan ruled. Although there was a “conscious disregard” for the victim’s safety, there was no intention to kill him.

Ryan found that the prosecution’s explanation to the jury of the “kill zone” theory was misleading and inaccurate.

The prosecution explained the theory this way: “Except if you intend to kill the person you want to kill and you don’t intend to, shoot someone who is in the same area.”

But Ryan ruled that intent is necessary even for those who are not the primary target.

“The court cannot find that it is clear beyond a reasonable doubt that a reasonable jury would have returned the same verdict absent these instruction errors,” Ryan ruled.