Man Receives 2 Death Sentences in Teen Slayings

James Robinson Jr., a bespectacled former college student, received two death sentences Friday for the execution-style murders of two teen-agers during a robbery at a Northridge sandwich shop where he once worked.

Robinson, 25, sat silently as San Fernando Superior Court Judge Ronald S. Coen told him: “You have done something atrocious. You have forfeited your right to live and I do sentence you to die.”

The slightly built, owlish-looking defendant--who was a part-time student at Cal State Northridge--listened impassively as his mother, Jackie Robinson, rehashed the trial testimony during a lengthy statement to the judge and the victims’ families. She implored them: “I just want you to think before you take my son’s life.”

He displayed no reaction to the heated words spoken by the mother of one of his victims, a youth who was visiting a friend at the Subway sandwich shop on Zelzah Avenue the night of June 30, 1991, when Robinson burst in at closing time, ordered them to the floor, then shot both teen-agers in the head after they complied with his orders to open a floor safe and cash register.

“James, you murdered my son Brian,” said Terry Berry, mother of 18-year-old Brian Berry. “You have destroyed my life. . . . I pray that God will never forgive you for what you’ve done, and I look forward to seeing you at your execution.”

Coen imposed the death penalty twice, once for the murder of Berry and once for that of James White, 19. The youths, close friends since the fourth grade, were buried together.

Before the sentence, defense attorney Richard Leonard urged the judge to reject the jury’s conclusion that a death sentence was warranted, arguing that race played a role in the decision. Robinson is black, and the two victims were white.

Deputy Dist. Atty. Kenneth L. Barshop stated that Robinson’s “callous, cruel, vicious actions”--not his race--determined his fate.

The prosecutor pointed out that testimony showed that White “more than likely was on his knees, begging for his life” when he was killed and that Berry, who was shot in the face, probably “saw it coming.” Robinson also shot Berry a second time, in the side of the head.

“This was a planned execution,” Barshop said. “He went there to rob and kill everyone and anyone who was there.”

Robinson, a former Subway employee who was fired because his supervisors suspected him of stealing $200, got about $580 in the holdup. About 12 hours after the robbery and double slaying, he used the money to rent a bachelor apartment nearby.

Later, Barshop said, Robinson “chuckled and laughed and giggled about executing these two boys” and told a friend next time he’d “have to get a gun with more . . . killing power.”

Robinson was convicted on two counts of murder and robbery, but the first jury could not reach a decision on whether to impose the death penalty. A second jury delivered a death verdict last month, after deliberating less than three hours.

Before the slayings, Robinson had no record of violent crime.