Murder Charges Based on Brother’s Tip

Murder charges filed against a Costa Mesa couple in the cocaine-related death of their infant daughter were based partly on information supplied by the woman’s brother, court records showed Friday.

Gilbert Delgado, 25, and his wife, Debbie, 23, entered not guilty pleas Friday in Superior Court Judge Myron S. Brown’s Santa Ana courtroom.

The couple are charged in the death Sept. 6, 1986, of Stephanie Delgado, their 2-month-old, 12-pound child. An autopsy showed that the child had 4 to 5 milligrams of cocaine in her system.

Prosecutors filed court papers Friday showing that Bruce Chavez told police that he had seen Gilbert Delgado selling cocaine on numerous occasions and also had seen Debbie Delgado use cocaine. Chavez is her brother.

The Delgados were bound over for trial last month on felony child endangerment charges. But a week later prosecutors raised the charges to murder.

Deputy Dist. Atty. Richard M. King said the decision was based partly on a review of the preliminary hearing evidence and partly on information not presented at that hearing.

On Friday, court papers indicated that King was referring to evidence from Chavez, who last week was taken into custody as a material witness--on $100,000 bail--after eluding police for several months.

King told the court that Chavez has admitted that he deliberately remained in hiding--he missed Christmas with his family--to avoid police questioning.

Chavez requested a hearing to force officials to release him, but it was put off for two weeks.

Lucinda Hatch, a witness at the preliminary hearing, testified that she had bought and used drugs at the Delgado house. But Hatch was only an occasional visitor to the Delgados’ home after Stephanie was born; Chavez was there regularly, according to court papers.

“He can show that the Delgados kept their child in a cocaine environment, where cocaine was near baby bottles and baby nipples,” one law enforcement official said.

Although the couple have been charged with murder, it appears likely from the evidence that prosecutors will seek a second-degree murder conviction, which carries a penalty of 15 years to life in prison.

Prosecutors have not accused the Delgados of deliberately giving their baby cocaine. But they could be convicted of second-degree murder if a jury is convinced that they engaged in illegal activity that they knew could be dangerous to their baby’s health.

The Delgados’ attorneys are seeking to have the murder charges dismissed before the trial. They are also trying to get the case transferred from the district attorney’s office to the state attorney general.

“There simply is no evidence to show that this is a case of murder,” said Deputy Public Defender Martin R. Kossak, Debbie Delgado’s attorney.

“If the prosecutors want to charge them with murder, they should have put on murder evidence at the preliminary hearing.”

The Delgados’ attorneys are also claiming a conflict of interest by the district attorney’s office because Lucinda Hatch, a key witness who was granted immunity, is a daughter of an investigator who works for the district attorney’s office. Also, they claim that Hatch’s father helped her with her testimony between morning and afternoon court sessions at the preliminary hearing.

“It certainly creates the appearance of impropriety,” Kossak said.

But King disagreed.

“We have a big office, and these things are going to happen; but there is no conflict at all,” King said.

The Delgados were not arrested until more than a year after their baby’s death because police could not find them. They had changed their name and moved from Santa Ana to Costa Mesa.

At the time of their arrest, police said they discovered several pounds of cocaine, a set of scales, baggies and records that authorities believe were related to drug deals.