SAN FERNANDO VALLEY : Youth Pleads No Contest in Slaying of Deaf Man
A Long Beach teen-ager who shot a deaf Palmdale man to death after a stoplight confrontation in Granada Hills pleaded no contest Friday to a charge of manslaughter in return for a 12-year prison sentence.
San Fernando Superior Court Judge Howard J. Schwab accepted the plea from Joey Paul Bellinger, 19, who had been charged with murdering Cesar Vieira, 30, and wounding Vieira’s brother, Edward, now 27, who is also deaf.
Bellinger, who was 16 at the time, was among a group of youths in a car that stopped for a traffic light at a Granada Hills intersection Jan. 28, 1990, and exchanged glares and insults with the Vieira brothers, who were on a motorcycle.
Both groups pulled into the parking lot of a nearby shopping center, where Bellinger fired several shots at the Vieiras.
Bellinger would have faced a maximum sentence of 30 years to life in prison if he had been convicted in a jury trial. Deputy Dist. Atty. Phil Halpin said the 12-year sentence was reasonable because it might have been difficult to get a jury to render a verdict of murder or manslaughter. A jury trial had been set to begin June 23.
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