Prosecutor Calls for Execution of Man Who Killed Guard : Courts: Lawyer tells jury the convict deserves capital punishment for slaying that occurred 25 days after his release from jail for another killing.

Promising that the jury will be shocked by the long history of a convicted killer’s crimes, a prosecutor argued Monday that the lifelong criminal should be executed for his latest murder.

After convicting Sean Darnell Slade two weeks ago of murdering an armored car guard during a robbery, the jury began hearing evidence to determine if the killer should be put to death or if he should spend the rest of his life behind bars.

“As long as he is sucking the air we breathe, he will be a menace to other human beings,” Deputy Dist. Atty. Jeff Jonas told the jurors as he argued for the death penalty.

Slade, 27, shot guard Edwin Maldonado in the back of the head during a July 29, 1992, robbery at a San Fernando Home Depot store. Maldonado, a 26-year-old employee of Sectran Armored Transportation and former Pasadena police officer, had just picked up $82,000 in receipts--about half of which was in cash--when Slade ran up behind him and fired without warning, according to witnesses.

The robbery-murder happened only 25 days after Slade was released from Soledad State Prison on parole after serving about four years for the 1987 killing of Howard Baker.

In his opening statement, Jonas said the Baker shooting was “a cold-blooded, premeditated, calculated murder of a friend over a canister of rock cocaine.”

Authorities said Baker was shot 2 1/2 months after Slade escaped from a California Youth Authority prison, where he was serving a term for an armed robbery at a Chuck E. Cheese restaurant in North Hollywood when he was 17.

When he was arrested, Slade “confessed with some pride as to his involvement” in the robbery that netted more than $10,000, Jonas said.

The key prosecution witness in that robbery was threatened, according to the prosecutor, demonstrating “how far one person’s tentacles can reach in society, even though he has been arrested and convicted.”

Defense attorney Bruce Hill did not address the jury Monday. He faces the task of convincing the panel that it should spare the life of a man who was convicted of murder after being incarcerated most of his adult life.

Slade has been out of custody for only three months during the past 10 years, according to prosecutors.

A San Fernando Superior Court jury, which heard the bulk of the case in Van Nuys because of earthquake damage to the San Fernando courthouse, deliberated three days before convicting Slade of first-degree murder in Maldonado’s death.

Throughout his trial, Slade maintained he was innocent and police had arrested the wrong man.

During the penalty phase of the trial, which is expected to last about one week, the panel of seven men and five women will hear for the first time about the murder victim’s life.