Death Penalty Rejected for Arsonists Who Killed 5 People : Courts: Jury recommends life terms without parole for 1991 fire at Jordan Downs housing project. Two panelists say they don’t believe men intended to kill anyone.

Rejecting the death penalty, a jury recommended that two men serve life terms without the possibility of parole for setting a fire that killed a great-grandmother, her granddaughter and the granddaughter’s three small children.

The prosecutor had argued passionately for the death penalty against Harold Mangram, 48, and Victor Spencer, 38, in the arson two years ago at the Jordan Downs housing project in Watts.

He noted that Mangram and Spencer, both cocaine addicts, set the fire because they hoped they would receive crack cocaine from drug dealers. The dealers had been using the porch of the dwelling for drug sales and wanted the family to move.

Killed in the Sept. 7, 1991, fire were Marta Zuniga Lopez, 22, her three children, ages 1 to 5, and Margarita Medina Hernandez, 78.

But two jurors who talked to reporters said they did not believe the convicted men intended to kill anyone. Their recommendation of a life sentence without the possibility of parole serves justice, they said.

Superior Court Judge Charles E. Horan set sentencing for Feb. 3. He can give Mangram and Spencer a more lenient sentence than the jury recommended but cannot give them a harsher one.

Deputy Dist. Atty. Sterling E. Norris said he was disappointed by the jury’s recommendation.

“The death penalty was warranted, I thought, because the crime was so horrendous,” he said.

During arguments earlier in the week, he noted that Mangram was earlier convicted of second-degree murder for killing his 14-year-old girlfriend 20 years ago and that Spencer was convicted of involuntary manslaughter in a 1977 slaying.

But Michael Abzug, who represented Spencer, pleaded with the jury not to “add more killings” to the arson case by recommending the death penalty for his client.

He and Mangram’s lawyer, Guy O’Brien, conceded that the crime was horrifying, but they said vengeance, not justice, would be served by putting the men to death. Mangram and Spencer, they said, had served sentences for their earlier crimes and would die in prison if the jury showed mercy.

Outside court, O’Brien had complained bitterly that a third man, Frank Villareal, 31, received probation for his part in the arson in exchange for his testimony against Mangram and Spencer.

Norris said the deal was necessary to convict Mangram and Spencer, who he said were more culpable than Villareal.

Villareal testified during the six-week trial that he came upon Mangram and Spencer pouring gasoline on the family’s front door. He volunteered his help, made a funnel out of some discarded cardboard, and put the funnel in the door’s mail chute, he acknowledged.

Mangram, according to Villareal, poured gasoline through the chute while Spencer stood by with a lighter. There were 17 people in the home at the time of the fire, most of them asleep.