People v. Fagundes CA3

BACKGROUND

The People charged defendant with murder (§ 187, subd. (a) – count I), arson causing great bodily injury (§ 451, subd. (a) – count II), making criminal threats (§ 422, subd. (a) – count III) and obstructing or resisting, by use of threat, force or violence, law enforcement personnel in the performance of their duty (§ 69 – count IV). At defendant’s first trial, the jury found him guilty on counts III and IV but deadlocked on the other

1 Undesignated statutory references are to the Penal Code.

2 counts. The People retried defendant on counts I and II. The following is a summary of the relevant facts from the evidence presented at the second trial. Defendant arrived in Manteca, California on May 28, 2019, from Washington state. He told his cousin Christina M. someone posted their daughters’ faces on pornography websites, people were harassing his daughters because of it, and he was in California to take care of it. Defendant said Christina M. knew the person responsible for the pornographic images. When defendant could not reach his daughters, he put gasoline into a gas can and picked up his half-sister Toni Jilbert from work. Jilbert’s husband last heard from her at…