OXNARD : Judge Sets Execution Date for Fauber

A Jan. 29 execution date was set Friday for Curtis L. Fauber, who was convicted of killing an Oxnard man in 1986.

But Fauber will probably spend several more years on California’s Death Row at San Quentin while his case is appealed in the federal courts, Deputy Dist. Atty. Donald C. Glynn said.

Fauber, 30, was convicted of first-degree murder in 1988 for the killing of Tom Urell. According to trial testimony, Fauber struck and killed Urell with the blunt end of an ax after breaking into the victim’s Oxnard Shores home in search of drugs and money.

Ventura County Superior Court Judge Robert C. Bradley imposed the death penalty, and on June 18 the California Supreme Court upheld the sentence. In September, the high court refused to reconsider its decision.

That action brought the appeals process to an end in state courts, and the case was sent back to Bradley to set an execution date. The judge said Friday that he chose Jan. 29 at the suggestion of officials at the San Quentin prison.

Glynn said he expects Fauber’s attorneys to obtain a stay of execution while they appeal in the federal courts. “It could be many years” before Fauber goes to the gas chamber, Glynn said. “I think it will happen. It will just take a while.”