Photo by Jesus Sanchez
East Los Angeles — A man was convicted today of murdering two men and a woman in East Los Angeles between 2014 and 2018 in what prosecutors said stemmed from his belief that the victims had disrespected him.
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The downtown Los Angeles jury deliberated about 5 1/2 hours before finding Anthony Velasquez, 35, guilty of three counts of first-degree murder.
Jurors also found true allegations that the defendant personally used a firearm in the Feb. 11, 2014, killing of Jesse Avalos; the July 6, 2015, slaying of Eduardo Robles; and the April 22, 2018, killing of Amanda Nicole Lopez.
Velasquez is facing 150 years to life in state prison, with sentencing set for Friday, according to Deputy District Attorney Catherine Mariano.
The defendant’s father, Manuel Velasquez, 55, pleaded no contest in February to voluntary manslaughter in connection with one of the killings, along with being an accessory after the fact. He was sentenced to 11 years and eight months in state prison, Mariano said.
In her closing argument, the prosecutor told jurors that “the defendant targeted, ambushed and killed three different people … people he felt disrespected (by) in one way or another.”
The deputy district attorney urged the panel to consider the physical evidence, items found in his house and “all of the incriminating statements” he made during an undercover jailhouse operation and to “hold the defendant accountable.”
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Defense attorney Leslie Ann Boyce countered that the facts of the case supported her client being acquitted in all three killings.
Velasquez’s lawyer called the killings “heinous” and “tragic,” but told jurors that it would be a “greater tragedy to hold someone accountable” who was not responsible for the murders.
She urged jurors to consider the killings as “three separate crimes,” calling it an “I.D. case” that the prosecution had not proven.
In her rebuttal argument, Deputy District Attorney Negin Mostadim countered that “the evidence is that he is responsible and he is involved in all of these murders.”
Avalos, 33, was found shot to death in the 4800 block of Telegraph Road, adjacent to the Santa Ana (5) Freeway and Bristow Park in Commerce. He had received a call from an acquaintance asking him to go to the location to jump-start a vehicle, and went there to help, according to Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department Capt. Joe Mendoza.
Avalos was found shot to death while seated in the driver’s seat of his SUV, Mendoza said at a 2021 news conference.
Robles, 38, was fatally shot in the driveway of a residence in the 4300 block of Eagle Street, near the Calvary Cemetery and Eastern Avenue, while Lopez was shot to death by a masked assailant inside a tent near a homeless encampment in the 200 block of South Fetterly Avenue in front of the East Los Angeles field office of Los Angeles County Supervisor Hilda Solis in the East Los Angeles Civic Center, Mendoza said then.
Velasquez and his father were arrested in September 2021 by the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department and have remained behind bars since then.
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