California IN BRIEF : SANTA ANA : Convicted Killer Ruled Sane by Jury

An Orange County Superior Court jury decided that Richard Lucio DeHoyos was sane when he sexually assaulted and murdered a 9-year-old girl. The action set the stage to determine whether he should be sentenced to death. “I want to see him dead,” said Sara Puente, mother of the slain schoolgirl, Nadia Puente, after the verdict was announced. “That is what he deserves.” The defense had presented testimony from an array of psychotherapists about DeHoyos’ brain damage and personality disorder. But the jury, after deliberating for about a day and a half, decided that the 34-year-old knew what he was doing in 1989 when he kidnaped and killed the Santa Ana fourth-grader and dumped her body in Los Angeles’ Griffith Park. After two days of deliberations, the same jury had convicted him Sept. 20 of first-degree murder, kidnaping, rape, sodomy and lewd conduct. Judge Everett W. Dickey said that he expected evidence in the penalty phase of the trial to be completed by Friday and that closing arguments and deliberations would take place early next week.