Accomplice of Officer’s Killer Gets 27 Years in Prison

A Sun Valley man who prosecutors said was present but did not pull the trigger in the shooting death last year of a rookie Los Angeles police officer was sentenced Friday to 27 years to life in prison.

Alberto Hernandez, 19, was prosecuted under a state law known as the felony murder rule, in which an accomplice can be convicted of first-degree murder for participating in a serious crime that results in a death.

It was not Hernandez, but Robert Steele, 16, who fatally shot Officer James Beyea on June 7 during a struggle for the officer’s revolver on a street near an electronics store that Hernandez and Steele had burglarized.

Beyea and his partner were investigating a burglary on Lankershim Boulevard in North Hollywood. Steele, of North Hollywood, was fatally shot by four police officers after he was tracked to a nearby vacant house.

During Hernandez’s murder trial in December, his attorney maintained that Hernandez was hiding in some bushes when Beyea was shot. But the prosecution said that Hernandez helped Steele take the officer’s gun.

Nevertheless, San Fernando Superior Court Judge John H. Major instructed jurors that a murder conviction required only a finding that Hernandez was guilty of burglary and that Beyea’s death occurred during the course of that burglary.

On Friday, Major denied a motion for a new trial by Deputy Public Defender James M. Coady, who was also unsuccessful in asking Major to reduce the verdict to second-degree murder. Coady argued that Major should have told jurors they could have considered second-degree murder or manslaughter. He said he will appeal the judge’s rulings and the verdict.

“He had the state of mind of somebody who wanted to steal a stereo, not the state of mind of somebody willing to commit murder to accomplish that goal,” Coady said.

Second-degree murder carries a sentence of 15 years to life. Major imposed a term of 25 years to life for Hernandez on the murder charge. Hernandez received an additional two years for the burglary.

“It was a proper sentence under the law,” Deputy Dist. Atty. Joseph R. Martinez said afterward. During the sentencing hearing, he told Major, “Mr. Hernandez is just as culpable as Mr. Steele.”

Hernandez will become eligible for parole in 18 years.

Beyea, 24, of Reseda was an Air Force veteran and a graduate of Cleveland High School in Reseda.