2 Death Sentences Reversed

The state Supreme Court today reversed the death sentences of two brothers for a double murder in Los Angeles because the jury was told that the governor could make them eligible for parole if they were not sentenced to death.

In the unanimous ruling in the case of Robert and Woodrow Warren the court said the trial judge’s instructions improperly tilted the jurors toward the death penalty. The Warrens were convicted of murdering Homero Flores and Antonio Herrera during a robbery on a Los Angeles street in September, 1979. The reversals were the seventh and eighth out of 27 death penalty appeals the current court has considered.