Highway murder trial in jury's hands

Deliberations began Friday, 27 days after the trial began and more than two years after Raymond Gardner, 22, died from a fatal shot to the back of the head.

At stake is a potential life sentence for John Navarro and Tito Sedeno, both 22, if convicted on first-degree murder, three counts of attempted murder and discharging a firearm. Sedeno is additionally facing charges of evading police during a high-speed chase and being a felon in possession of a firearm - charges his defense attorney Mara Feiger admitted during her Wednesday closing arguments are true. Weiher is representing Navarro.

Some facts in the case are undisputed. In the early hours of Jan. 12, 2003, two cars carrying Gardner and three friends drove from San Jose on Highway 101 toward Pacifica along Interstate 380. At one point, they encountered a Chevrolet Tahoe driven by Sedeno and carrying Navarro and Richard Sedillo. The three men were coming from a birthday party in San Francisco. A hail of 9 mm bullets fired from the SUV toward the two other cars, one killing Gardner. He was taken to a South San Francisco hospital by his friends and pronounced dead hours later.

Following the shooting, the defendants and Sedillo went to Sedeno's Pacifica apartment before heading to Denny's to eat. While there, Daly City police spotted the vehicle and chased it throughout the Bay Area. After crashing in San Francisco's Mission District, the three men were arrested. Sedillo was released days later after fingering the two others as the shooters.

During the nearly month-long trial, though, defense attorneys for both defendants worked tirelessly to fill in gaps in the chain of events which they say prove their clients' innocence.

"We have the general story but there are variations, certainly," Weiher said before offering the jury a third version of the morning's events.

Both Feiger and Weiher told jurors Sedillo, now a prosecution witness who went into protective custody, is actually the shooter. Feiger even offered up Lois Buenaflor, a 23-year-old schizophrenic woman who claimed to be a fourth person in the SUV. She implicated Sedillo as the shooter and eventually told jurors the defendants also used weapons. She even said Sedillo pointed a gun at her head similar to the one identified by Gardner's friend.

A 'vulnerable' witness

Both Weiher and prosecutor Sean Gallagher discount her testimony. During his closing, Gallagher told jurors she is simply a vulnerable woman exploited by Sedeno's supporters. Yesterday, Weiher mimicked Gallagher by calling Buenaflor a "very sad case" whose reality can't connect with that of everybody else. Buenaflor is "somewhat confused and delusional," Weiher said.

In reaching their verdict, jurors must decide if they believe either Buenaflor or Sedillo. Neither defendant testified on his own behalf, leaving each defense predicated primarily on forensics, party-goer's testimony and jabs at Sedillo's credibility.

"By any stretch of the imagination, Mr. Sedillo is a thug," said Weiher, who also peppered her arguments with descriptions like very unreliable, woman beater, gang member and liar.

On Wednesday, Feiger suggested Sedillo shot at the cars because he disliked the Asian drivers. She also said he cooperated with police - and lied about his own involvement - because of his own checkered criminal past.

Weiher, too, harkened to Sedillo's background as reason for him to pre-emptively tell police details that would explain why witnesses saw a gun extended from his window.

"He may not be smart but he's wily and practical and he knows what he has to say," Weiher said.

Sedillo became a main prosecution witness and entered the witness protection program.

Defense attorneys even cast suspicion on each other's clients. Gardner's friends testified about seeing a hand and a gun but could not attach a specific face to the shooter or shooters. Feiger, on Wednesday, questioned why Navarro had bullets in his pocket at the time of arrest. Weiher said there is no way of knowing where they came from or how long they'd been on Navarro. She argued there was only one gun and only one shooter: Sedillo.

Gallagher told jurors a defendant is guilty just by aiding and abetting the shooting. For instance, if Sedeno never fired a shot but drove the car in a specific way to let one of the other two shoot he is guilty of aiding and abetting, Gallagher said. Under the law, that would make Sedeno just as guilty. Gallagher, though, maintains both defendants fired weapons.

No guns were recovered. A witness testified seeing items, possibly gun parts, tossed from the SUV during the high-speed chase across the San Mateo Bridge.

'An intentional act'

The jury retired to deliberate after lunch, following closing instructions from Judge Joseph Bergeron. If they do not believe either or both defendants acted with pre-mediation, jurors can return a lesser verdict of second-degree murder. On Wednesday, Gallagher argued that even without a specific intent to kill Gardner, the men are guilty of firing a weapon into an occupied vehicle. The act is so inherently dangerous it makes them guilty of first-degree murder, he said.

But, Gallagher re-emphasized at the end of his rebuttal, the defendants knew what they were doing more than two years ago.

"They didn't speed up and chase down that Infiniti just to give them a dirty look. It was an intentional act to bring about the death of someone in that car," he said.

Like Weiher, Gallagher also gave the jury his own request: "Take them off the street."

Michelle Durand can be reached by e-mail: michelle@smdailyjournal.com or by phone: (650) 344-5200 ext. 104. What do you think of this story? Send a letter to the editor: letters@smdailyjournal.com.