Life without parole for double-murderer

The property manager accused of savagely murdering the Millbrae couple who were both his friends and longtime employers after they learned he was stealing money will die in prison after being sentenced yesterday to life without the possibility of parole.

Joseph George Cua, 54, was convicted of two counts first-degree murder and the special allegation of committing multiple murders in the June 13, 2006 deaths of Fernand and Suzanne Wagner, a 78-year-old investor and his 68-year-old part-time hairstylist wife. Cua also receives two extra years for allegations he used a knife on the couple although it hardly matters since the primary counts brought a mandatory term of life in prison without parole.

Judge Norman Gatzert imposed the sentence after first denying a defense request for a new trial and also for another delay. Sentencing had been postponed multiple times since his June 27, 2008 conviction. Gatzert deemed the slayings "cold and deliberate.”

Jurors deliberated little more than a day before finding Cua guilty of the double-killing the prosecution argued was Joseph George Cua’s attempt to prevent his financial house of cards from collapsing.

Cua was friends with the couple for more than two decades and collected rent on their properties. The prosecution told jurors Cua killed the couple after they began learning he stole more than $230,000 to support a lavish lifestyle.

After returning its decision, the jury said the deliberations hinged more on the degree of murder rather than Cua’s actual guilt.

Cua did not testify on his own behalf in his trial in which the prosecution tied together circumstantial evidence and the defense focused on unidentified DNA at the crime scene which it said pointed to a different killer.

According to the prosecution, Fernand Wagner learned the week before the killings that his bank accounts were missing funds. Cua was in charge of collecting rent money but allegedly charged tenants more than he was depositing, pocketing the rest for a lifestyle of expensive cars and both a Southern California wife and Bay Area girlfriend.

Cua went to the Wagner home June 13, 2006, Suzanne Wagner’s birthday and the day Fernand Wagner had an appointment with Wells Fargo Bank to discuss the financial discrepancies.

The following day, Millbrae police discovered the couple dead inside the Lomita Avenue house after Suzanne Wagner’s co-worker reported she failed to arrive for her job at a hair salon in Burlingame. Both had been brutally beaten. Fernand Wagner, in the hallway, also had a slice across his jugular vein. Suzanne Wagner, 10 feet away in the den, also appeared to be strangled. She was dressed only in a bra and had a genital cut; Gallagher alleged Cua moved her body after the beating, stripping and further harming her in a failed attempt to make the scene look like a sexual assault and robbery.

The couple’s Cadillac was missing from the home and later recovered in Daly City with Suzanne Wagner’s bloody cocktail ring and a small drop of Cua’s blood inside.

Authorities believed they were killed the previous morning based on uncollected newspapers and longtime friend Edith Edmonds who called and unexpectedly spoke with Cua, with whom she was also long-acquainted.

The defense claimed Cua went to the home but left. He returned later and discovered the bodies, fleeing out of fear he would be the prime suspect because of his business arrangement with the couple.

Cua, who split his time between the Burlingame apartment provided by the Wagners and the Southern California city of Hemet, was arrested June 19, 2006 in Oxnard. Police found him driving a truck with another car’s license plate and retrieved a handwritten letter to his wife Joy, claiming unnamed people threatened the family if he didn’t admit being in the Wagner home with the bodies.

Wagners’ relatives targeted Cua as a suspect because they didn’t like or understand his relationship with the couple, defense attorney Ed Pomeroy told jurors during trial

Fernand Wagner was an astute businessman who knew the location of every nickel, Pomeroy said.

The prosecution, however, said the Wagners — like others duped by Cua’s stories of being a businessman or developer — trusted him until learning his bank account couldn’t cover a quarterly tax payment.

In return for managing the Wagners’ Peninsula and San Jose properties, Cua received a free Burlingame apartment and $525. Yet he had more than $100,000 in consumer debt requiring $4,600 monthly in minimum payments. His life was a financial house of cards, kiting checks through four personal checking accounts and eventually hoping that by killing the Wagners and serving as the estate executor he could keep the questions at bay, Gallagher said.

The Wagners had changed their estate, leaving Cua to only receive money if the properties were sold.

Cua did not learn that, however, until after the murders.

Cua has been in custody on no-bail status since his arrest.

Michelle Durand can be reached by e-mail: michelle@smdailyjournal.com or by phone: (650) 344-5200 ext. 102.