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2 Guilty In Araujo Murder Case
Two northern California men were convicted Monday in the slaying of transgendered teen Gwen Araujo but a mistrial was declared for the third defendant when the jury could not agree on a verdict.
2 Guilty In Aruajo Murder Case
by Mark Worrall 365Gay.com San Francisco Bureau
Posted: September 12, 2005 7:00 pm ET
(Hayward, California) Two northern California men were convicted Monday in the slaying of transgendered teen Gwen Araujo but a mistrial was declared for the third defendant when the jury could not agree on a verdict.
Michael Magidson and Jose Merel were found guilty of second degree murder. They face mandatory sentences of 15 years to life in prison
It will be up to the Alameda County District Attorney to decide whether to pursue a third trial against the third defendant, Jason Cazares.
Seventeen year old Gwen Araujo was beaten, battered with a shovel and then strangled to death in October 2002 after the men discovered she was biologically male. Her body was found in a shallow grave several days later.
The first signs the jury was having a problem came last week when the eight men and four women told Judge Harry Sheppard that they had reached verdicts on two of the defendants but not on the third. (story)
Sheppard ordered the verdicts sealed and told the jurors to try to keep deliberating.
On Friday the jury again returned to the courtroom to tell Sheppard they could not reach a decision on the third defendant. They then asked the judge if the first two verdicts would be voided if they could not reach a decision on the third. (story)
Sheppard said the first two verdicts would remain intact and told jurors to resume their deliberations on Monday.
But, Monday morning, once again the jury told Sheppard they were deadlocked on the third defendant. Sheppard said that if a decision could not be reached by Monday afternoon he would unseal and read the verdicts on the first two defendants.
The first trial ended in a hung jury last year when jurors were unable to reach agreement on whether to find the men guilty of first or second degree murder. (story)
In the first trial the three defense teams worked together and their clients did not testify. This time, all three defendants testified - each pointing the finger at the other.
After hearing testimony from Merel and Magidson Deputy District Attorney Chris Lamiero told jurors that he was only seeking murder convictions against Magidson and Cazares.
A fourth man, Jaron Nabors, already pleaded guilty last year to voluntary manslaughter in exchange for testimony against his three friends.
©365Gay.com 2005
by Mark Worrall 365Gay.com San Francisco Bureau
Posted: September 12, 2005 7:00 pm ET
(Hayward, California) Two northern California men were convicted Monday in the slaying of transgendered teen Gwen Araujo but a mistrial was declared for the third defendant when the jury could not agree on a verdict.
Michael Magidson and Jose Merel were found guilty of second degree murder. They face mandatory sentences of 15 years to life in prison
It will be up to the Alameda County District Attorney to decide whether to pursue a third trial against the third defendant, Jason Cazares.
Seventeen year old Gwen Araujo was beaten, battered with a shovel and then strangled to death in October 2002 after the men discovered she was biologically male. Her body was found in a shallow grave several days later.
The first signs the jury was having a problem came last week when the eight men and four women told Judge Harry Sheppard that they had reached verdicts on two of the defendants but not on the third. (story)
Sheppard ordered the verdicts sealed and told the jurors to try to keep deliberating.
On Friday the jury again returned to the courtroom to tell Sheppard they could not reach a decision on the third defendant. They then asked the judge if the first two verdicts would be voided if they could not reach a decision on the third. (story)
Sheppard said the first two verdicts would remain intact and told jurors to resume their deliberations on Monday.
But, Monday morning, once again the jury told Sheppard they were deadlocked on the third defendant. Sheppard said that if a decision could not be reached by Monday afternoon he would unseal and read the verdicts on the first two defendants.
The first trial ended in a hung jury last year when jurors were unable to reach agreement on whether to find the men guilty of first or second degree murder. (story)
In the first trial the three defense teams worked together and their clients did not testify. This time, all three defendants testified - each pointing the finger at the other.
After hearing testimony from Merel and Magidson Deputy District Attorney Chris Lamiero told jurors that he was only seeking murder convictions against Magidson and Cazares.
A fourth man, Jaron Nabors, already pleaded guilty last year to voluntary manslaughter in exchange for testimony against his three friends.
©365Gay.com 2005
For more information:
http://www.365gay.com/newscon05/09/091205a...
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IMC Network
Araujo retrial ends with 2 verdicts, mistrial
Tom Musbach, PlanetOut Network
published Monday, September 12, 2005
The retrial of three men accused of murdering transgender teen Gwen Araujo ended Monday in Hayward, Calif., with guilty verdicts for two of the defendants and a mistrial for the third.
The three men, Jason Cazares, Michael Magidson and Jose Merel, all 25, were charged with first-degree murder.
Magidson and Merel were both found guilty of second-degree murder with no hate-crime enhancement. The jury deadlocked on the fate of Cazares, so Alameda County Superior Court Judge Harry Sheppard declared a mistrial.
The dates for sentencing and a possible retrial for Cazares were not yet known. The murder convictions carry possible prison terms of 15 years to life.
The long-awaited outcome was greeted with both tears and cheers by Araujo's family, friends and their supporters, who anguished after last year's trial of the three men ended with a hung jury.
"Make no mistake, this is a huge victory today," Christopher Daley, director of the Transgender Law Center, told the PlanetOut Network.
"It's a huge victory for the [transgender] community that these two men are being held accountable," he added. "It's our hope that the district attorney will make the same commitment to making sure that Cazares is held accountable."
As the verdicts were read, Merel slumped in his chair and cried. Magidson showed no emotion, according to Olson.
A fourth man in the case, Jaron Nabors, pleaded guilty to manslaughter in 2003 and was sentenced to 11 years in prison.
The 17-year-old Araujo was beaten and strangled on Oct. 4, 2002, at a party in Newark, after the men -- all friends -- learned that she was biologically male. Her body was found in a shallow grave in the Sierra foothills.
Cazares was the only one of the four men who did not have prior sexual encounters with Araujo, whom they knew as "Lida."
The eight-man, four-woman jury took a longer time in reaching a verdict for Cazares, as they handed the judge sealed decisions on the other two defendants last Thursday. The jurors began their deliberations on Aug. 30.
Two found guilty of 2nd degree murder in Araujo case, jury deadlocks on third man
By Yomi S. Wronge
Mercury News
An Alameda County jury this afternoon convicted two defendants for the killing of a transgender Newark teenager, but deadlocked on the third defendant.
Capping the second trial in the Gwen Araujo case, the jury found Michael Magidson and Jose Merel guilty of second degree murder in verdicts unsealed this afternoon in Hayward. But the four-woman, eight-man jury deadlocked 9-3 in favor of a second degree murder conviction for Jason Cazares.
Judge Harry Sheppard declared .wa mistrial in Cazares' case. It will be up to the Alameda County District Attorney to decide whether to pursue a third trial against him.
Magidson and Merel could received 15 years to life in prison.
This was the second trial for the three men, who grew up in southern Alameda County. Last year a mistrial was declared after a previous jury deadlocked on charges against Magidson, Cazares and Merel, who are all 25 years old. The district attorney's office refiled the charges, and the second trial began June 1.
The jury had been deliberating since Aug. 31. By last week, they had reportedly reached verdicts on two defendants, but reportedly had reached an impasse on the third defendant.
Defense lawyers in the first trial seemed to work in tandem, at once attacking the credibility of the state's star witness -- Jaron Nabors, a fourth man who was part of the killing and struck a deal with prosecutors to avoid a lengthy prison sentence -- and asserting that Gwen's killing was manslaughter, a lesser offense committed in the heat of passion by young men suddenly and violently confused about their own sexuality.
Cazares was the only defendant to take the stand during the first trial. All three testified in their own defense in the retrial.
Magidson told jurors that Nabors killed Gwen, Merel said Magidson told him he killed the victim, and Cazares said he was outside Merel's Newark house smoking when the slaying occurred. Magidson confessed to killing following his arrest, but during the retrial he said he did not strangle Gwen and made the confession out of misguided loyalty to his friend.
According to prosecutor Chris Lamiero, Gwen was killed at Merel's house in the early morning hours of Oct. 4, 2002. She was choked, punched, bound and gagged by Magidson, whose raged boiled over when he discovered he had been intimate with a biological male.
A medical examiner has determined that Gwen died of blunt trauma and asphyxiation due to strangulation.
Cazares, he asserted, helped Magidson by keeping things under control until other witnesses left the scene and by retrieving shovels from his own house to bury the teen.
The group drove to South Lake Tahoe and buried the body in a shallow grave. On the way home, the guys stopped for breakfast at McDonald's, where they swore one another to secrecy.
J. Tony Serra, Cazares' attorney, said the defendants were caught up in extraordinary circumstances: the discovery that girl they had sex with was anatomically male, igniting a '' classic crime of passion.''
And defense lawyers collectively attacked Nabors, alleging he was more involved in the killing than he or the prosecution indicated.
Contact Yomi S. Wronge at ywronge [at] mercurynews.com or (408) 920-5744.
You cannot claim to be some kind of progressive and support any prison time. Things will only be made worse as the money spent on punishment would be better spent on education of teenage boys to support the gay/transgender liberation movement. This verdict will not prevent this kind of thing from happening again as the sex party routine exists in a declining society. Some of the idiots at this sex party were married men, and yet they still had time to play around with each other and the victim! We can only wonder why they got married!
Once again, our tax dollars are being flushed down the drain to promote punishment. This is anti-gay by any definition.
they got 15 years for being psycho murdering homophobic homosexual motherfuckers
I don't buy for a second that they were suprised to learn the gender of their anal sex partner. bunch of bs the press never deals with. like you wouldn't notice hanging equipment there. they just got called out for it, after bragging probably thinking no one else knew Gwen's gender, and couldn't deal so they killed her to prove how hetero and macho they were
people like that gotta be locked up! I don't give a rat's ass about their rebilitation right now. they've got 15 years to think about how absolutely fucked up they are. see if that rebilitates them
regardless, Gwen will never be back.
(2)
As for the other inmates in the California prison system:
Most of the inmates are non-violent drug addicts
(including many who are mentally ill),
who did crimes to finance their habits;
and they do need rehabilitation.
Plus, in any particular month,
many of the expensive prison cells are being occupied
by guys who have already served their basic sentence,
have been paroled,
and then have been sent back temporarily for
violating the conditions (rules) of their probation.
And Community Gathering
2 Guilty of 2nd Degree Murder,
3rd case ends in hung jury
Community Gathers Tonight
[Monday, Sept. 12]
6 PM
(San Francisco, September 12, 2005).
The verdicts on last of three defendants in the murder of Gwen Araujo were given today.
There will be press conference at 6 PM at the San Francisco Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender Community Center.
We are also inviting members of our community to come together tonight at 6 PM in front of the altar which has been built and dedicated to the memory of Gwen.
Today's verdict brings mixed feelings, finally some justice, but still not completely settled.
We are working with the Transgender Law Center to make sure the community is informed about the outcome as soon as it happens. Community United Against Violence (CUAV) and Lavender Youth Recreation Information Center (LYRIC) will also have speakers at the press conference.
This is the second trial of three men accused of murdering Gwen Araujo, a transgender teen. The first trial ended in a hung jury.
This time the defendants are turning on each other, but they continue to victimize Gwen by claiming "transgender panic" as a defense for their brutal violence.
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An eye for an eye not only makes the whole world blind, it wastes our tax dollars and is profoundly stupid. Thus, I will never vote to convict anyone of anything and I will never vote for the death penalty. The sooner we abolish prisons and the death penalty, the sooner we will have the resources to ending street crime and its related social causes.