The verdict is in : Guilty of Murder

So, I was selected in a jury pool about a month ago for a murder trial. I am glad to have been dismissed due to my emotional bias towards such a case.

This afternoon I came across an online news article and all three suspects were found guilty of murder.

What I didn't know was the key witness to this case was their housekeeper who was an accomplice to those three. This bitch probably got a plea bargain - tell on "your friends" and you might get a lighter sentence.


here is the link:
http://www.thereporter.com/ci_13761310?source=most_viewed

and here is the article by Brian Hamlin for The Reporter



A Solano County Superior Court jury on Tuesday found three Woodland residents guilty of first-degree murder in connection with a violent home invasion robbery that led to the death of an elderly Vacaville resident three years ago.

The nine-woman, three-man jury deliberated roughly eight hours before ruling that 42-year-old James Patrick Ray, 38-year-old Christopher Morgan and 39-year-old Paula Renee Moyer were guilty of murder in the commission of a burglary. In addition, the jury found that Ray and Morgan had committed the murder in the course of a robbery.


They face possible maximum sentences of life imprisonment without possibility of parole. Following the verdict, Judge William C. Harrison set 9 a.m. Dec. 15 for judgment and sentencing in the case.


The three were arrested by Vacaville police following a May 5, 2006, home invasion during which 78-year-old Farhan Jweinat suffered multiple injuries. He was hospitalized after the attack but his condition worsened and he later died.


A fourth Woodland resident arrested in connection with the home invasion, 30-year-old Karly Ann Harrison, pleaded no contest to one count of burglary prior to trial and admitted that she had accompanied Morgan, Moyer and Ray to Jweinat's home the day of the break-in. Moyer, she stated, had been a housekeeper at the residence and had confessed to having stolen more than $70,000 from the house while she worked there.


On the day of the incident, Harrison told police she waited


outside while Morgan and Ray went into the home. Moyer later joined them and, when they came out, Harrison said they were carrying "all kinds of stuff" from the residence.

Harrison told police that the others told her that she didn't want to know what happened inside.


Defense attorneys in the case repeatedly attacked Harrison's statements and her motivation, claiming that she testified only to obtain leniency and that her descriptions of the incident and the events leading up to it were inconsistent and contradictory.


Ray's defense attorney, William Maas, also produced several alibi witnesses for his client -- several members of a Sacramento family who testified that Ray was at their residence at the time of the home invasion robbery in Vacaville.


Prosecuting Deputy District Attorney Terry Ray subsequently argued that the family's testimony about the time and date of Ray's presence also seemed to be contradictory.