People v. Vasquez-Collazos CA4/3

FACTS

The seeds of this case were sown in Peru, which is where appellant met her alleged coconspirator and fellow Peruvian Roberto Saavedra around 2009. Although they dated for some time, appellant ended up marrying Adrian Zapata, who was more than 20 years her senior. Zapata was born in Peru and visited there often, but he lived and worked in Orange County, so his relationship with appellant was primarily long distance at first. However, in 2013, appellant left Peru with her two children and moved 1 into Zapata’s Westminster apartment with him.

1 Appellant’s children were from relationships that preceded her meeting Zapata and Saavedra.

2 This brought appellant and Zapata closer together physically, but appellant still had feelings for Saavedra. In fact, by the time appellant moved to the United States, she and Saavedra had been having an affair for quite some time. To keep the affair going, Saavedra moved from Peru to Van Nuys not long after appellant moved to Westminster. After that, appellant used a secret phone to communicate with Saavedra, so Zapata had no reason to suspect he or his relationship was in any sort of danger. But on May 22, 2014, just two months after…