Ex-Convicts Indicted Under Law Targeting Longtime Criminals : Courts: Using a law aimed at “career criminals,” a grand jury indicts two men in shooting incidents that could bring each suspect life in prison without parole.

A federal grand jury Thursday indicted two ex-convicts who traded gunfire with San Diego police--in separate incidents--under a novel law that targets “career criminals” and could bring each suspect life in prison without parole, prosecutors said.

Stanley Lee Vance, 31, of San Diego, was indicted in connection with the July 16 shooting in Southeast San Diego of an off-duty rookie officer, Assistant U.S. Atty. Larry Burns said.

James Scott Daly, 28, of San Diego, was charged in connection with an 11-hour standoff with police in late June at a Pacific Beach motel, Burns said.

Both Vance and Daly were charged in single-count indictments under a 1986 law--the federal Armed Career Criminal Act--that targets repeat offenders possessing firearms and ammunition, Burns said. No date has been set for arraignment on either case, he said.

A conviction could result in a prison sentence ranging from 30 years to life without parole, Burns said. But he added that he did not know yet whether he would ask for the no-parole life term in either case.

“It would probably be presumptuous of me to say,” because neither man has been convicted, Burns said.

Burns was the prosecutor in a case that resulted last August in a no-parole life sentence for Warren James Bland, the first time the maximum term had been imposed in California.

However, Bland, who had terrorized women and children in a series of sexual assaults for three decades, and was convicted under the new law of gun possession by a repeat felon, won a reversal of that sentence July 11.

A federal appeals court ruled that the San Diego judge who imposed the sentence, U.S. District Judge J. Lawrence Irving, improperly told jurors that Bland was wanted in another case. Prosecutors intend to bring Bland to trial again on the gun charge, Burns said.

Vance, who also goes by the name Stanley Wheeler and was convicted in 1978 of three San Diego armed robberies, was charged with possessing the ammunition used to wound San Diego police Officer David Mitchell, according to the indictment. Police have been unable to find the gun used in the shooting, Burns said.

Mitchell, who was off-duty and not in uniform, exchanged shots moments after approaching a green pickup truck at 7:50 p.m. July 16 in a Southeast San Diego parking lot, witnesses and police have said.

The driver of the truck sped away but crashed into a concrete wall six blocks away and slid the truck into a yard, police said. Officers discovered Vance in the pickup when they arrived, police said.

Vance, who was released from prison in 1982, remains at UC San Diego Medical Center with a gunshot wound in the chest. He was in good condition Thursday, a spokeswoman said.

Though Vance was held initially on suspicion of assault with a deadly weapon, a state criminal charge, Burns said it was expected that the San Diego County district attorney’s office would dismiss that charge pending the outcome of the federal case.

Mitchell, who was graduated from the police academy in April, was wounded in the chest and in both arms. He was released earlier this week from UC San Diego Medical Center, but slugs remain in his body, Burns said.

Daly was charged Thursday in connection with the standoff at the Western Shores Motel in Pacific Beach that ended early June 23, according to the indictment.

Eleven hours after he barricaded himself in a room inside the motel, Daly was flushed out by tear gas fired by San Diego police officers specially trained in Special Weapons and Tactics, or SWAT, procedures.

During the barricade, Daly fired more than two dozen shots at officers, police reported. The indictment charged him with possession of a 9-millimeter handgun.