Male Prostitute Gets 5 Years for Slaying Newport Eye Doctor

A Superior Court judge Friday sentenced a male prostitute to the maximum possible term of five years in prison for the death of a Newport Beach doctor but said he wished the sentence could have been longer.

Allen J. Lindsey, 23, was convicted by a jury last month of involuntary manslaughter in the Jan. 19 stabbing of ophthalmologist Boonkird Chulapatrcheevin, known as Dr. Chula, at the doctor’s home.

Jurors said Lindsey may have been telling the truth when he said that Chula, who had invited him to the house, had attacked him while he was taking a shower. But the jurors found that Lindsey used excessive force to defend himself.

Lindsey, in seeking probation from Judge Robert R. Fitzgerald, told the court Friday, “I am sorry that a life was taken.” But he maintained that he was innocent of any crime and had only defended himself when the doctor tried to stab him with a knife.

Lindsey’s lawyer, Deputy Public Defender Anthony C. Kies, told the judge that if Lindsey had not defended himself, “it would be Dr. Chula sitting here on trial.”

But Fitzgerald made it clear that he did not agree with the jury’s verdict.

“This was an exceptionally brutal crime,” the judge said. “It’s unfortunate that I have my hands tied in the amount of time that I can give him.”

If jurors had elevated the conviction to second-degree murder, Fitzgerald could have given Lindsey an automatic sentence of 15 years to life plus one year for the use of the knife.

The maximum sentence for involuntary manslaughter is four years, plus one year for using the knife.

Fitzgerald did not directly criticize the jury’s verdict. But he said he regretted that because of the verdict, “there is absolutely nothing else the court can do” beyond the five-year prison term.

Several close friends and relatives of Dr. Chula, a native of Thailand who had practiced in Santa Ana for 10 years, smiled and nodded agreement at Fitzgerald’s sentence.

Fitzgerald told Kies that he would not even consider probation for the defendant, who was arrested five days after the stabbing while driving the doctor’s Mercedes-Benz in Hollywood. Lindsey had said he took the car only because he needed transportation back to Los Angeles.

He told authorities that Dr. Chula had hired his services as a prostitute but that once they got to the doctor’s house, the victim had accused Lindsey of trying to steal from him and then came after him with a knife.