UPDATE, NOV. 2, NOON: As happened to his brother Juan Manuel Villanueva on Tuesday, parole was denied this morning for Jose Luis Villanueva, who is imprisoned for the same 1994 stabbing-murder and attempted murders
There was one difference: Juan, 35, will have a chance to go before the state parole board again in 2016. Jose, 37, must wait until 2021.
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ORIGINAL POST, NOV. 2, 9:19 A.M.: Parole was denied Tuesday for Juan Manuel Villanueva,
who was part of a large group of gang members who surrounded three
young men in a Fullerton alley in 1994 before beating and stabbing to
death a 20-year-old man and attempting to murder the other two.
The inmate's older brother, Jose Luis Villanueva, is scheduled to make his own bid for parole this morning.
Juan was 17 and Jose was 19 when they and other gang members drove
around Fullerton looking for trouble on March 31, 1994. They confronted
the 20-year-old, Charles Matthews. They thought he had yelled, “fuck you.” The gang members then drove off. They later returned to
the same Fullerton neighborhood with even more thugs in tow.
They
found Matthews, Ricky Michaels, 18, and Julio
Duenas, 17, in a back alley. Outnumbered, the trio asked the gang
members not to get violent. That request was denied. A fight broke
out. All three were repeatedly stabbed. Michaels was murdered. Matthews and Duenas were left in critical condition. The gang bangers fled. They laughed and smiled as they
ran away.
The Fullerton Police Department
investigated the case. The Villanueva brothers were fingered. Juan, who was 17, was tried as an adult. A jury found him guilty of one felony
count
of second degree murder and two felony counts of attempted murder. He
was sentenced on June 9, 1995, to 15 years to life in state prison. A
jury found Jose guilty of the same counts. He was sentenced on Feb.
24, 1995, to 24 years and four months to life in prison.
Now 35-year-old Juan's parole was denied at Chuckawalla State
Prison in Blythe on Tuesday. Orange County Deputy District Attorney Barbara Kim
appeared at the
hearing to oppose Villanueva's parole on grounds he has not
rehabilitated nor shown remorse for his crimes. He gets his next crack
at parole in 2016.
Senior
Deputy District Attorney Ray Armstrong is appearing via
video-conference this morning to oppose 37-year-old Jose Villanueva's parole bid at Salinas Valley
State Prison in Soledad. Armstrong will cite the same argument that was used to keep Jose's brother inside.
According to a statement from prosecutors, the older Villanueva has “failed to
rehabilitate and has shown an inability to follow the rules, even while
incarcerated, by accumulating eight serious prison rules violations for
stabbing another inmate, theft, possessing a deadly weapon, mutual
combat, participating in a riot, participating in a group melee, and
being out of bounds.”
He is also alleged to have expressed no remorse for his crimes. Just like his brother.
OC Weekly Editor-in-Chief Matt Coker has been engaging, enraging and entertaining readers of newspapers, magazines and websites for decades. He spent the first 13 years of his career in journalism at daily newspapers before “graduating” to OC Weekly in 1995 as the alternative newsweekly’s first calendar editor.