The People v. Crespo CA2/1

BACKGROUND

About 7:00 a.m. on April 9, 2009, defendant fatally shot Raul Avila, Jr., then shot at Raul Avila, Sr. (“Raul’s father”), who pursued defendant as he fled on foot. (Undesignated date references pertain to 2009.) Both Raul and defendant had previously been romantically involved with Samantha Fierroz, and defendant and Fierroz had a son, C.C., who was approximately one year eight months old at the time of the shooting. Fierroz had broken up with defendant in December of 2008, and had rekindled a relationship with Raul in February of 2009. Defendant found out Fierroz was seeing Raul and fought with her about it. Defendant testified at his trial and admitted he did not like Raul. He was “[r]eally mad” because Raul spent more time with C.C. than defendant did, and he did not want C.C. to view Raul as a father figure. Defendant claimed Fierroz “would always make up excuses” to prevent defendant from seeing C.C., and sometimes said she was at Raul’s house. This bothered defendant and he spoke to both Fierroz and Raul about it, but denied telling them to breakup or stay away from one another. Defendant denied that he had sent Raul a threatening message on MySpace. He claimed…