Grim Court Battle Looms in Sex Slaying of Girl, 8 : Crime: With one of their own accused, Iranian immigrant community watches uneasily. ‘It’s going to be a very ugly trial,’ the victim’s mother says.

As Hooman Ashkan Panah’s capital murder trial begins, there is no doubt that emotions run deep about this case involving the sexual assault and murder of second-grader Nicole Parker. The signs are everywhere:

Carved in a wooden railing outside Superior Court Judge Sandy Kreigler’s sixth-floor Van Nuys courtroom is graffiti warning that the “sex kid,” Panah, “must die.”

A bailiff who escorted the once suicidal defendant to court recently was assigned to other duties after reportedly telling Panah, “Why don’t you just kill yourself and save the taxpayers time and money?”

A seasoned detective broke into tears on the witness stand in pretrial hearings last month as he recounted his futile search for Nicole.

Defense attorney Robert Sheahen recalled in court papers that he recently met a longtime legal colleague who told him, “No offense, Bob, but I hope your guy dies.”

Panah, a 23-year-old department store clerk, is charged with murder, kidnaping, rape, sodomy and committing lewd acts with a child. He could face the death penalty.

He has pleaded not guilty to the charges and plans to employ an insanity defense. Testimony in the trial is scheduled to begin Monday.

Court records lay bare the ugliness of the killing, and set the stage for what could be a disturbing courtroom battle.

“It’s going to be a very ugly trial,” said Nicole’s mother, Lori Parker. “I’m dreading it.”

Southern California’s Iranian community also is abuzz about the case because Panah is believed to be the first Iranian immigrant to face a possible death sentence in California.

Television coverage in the community of Iranian immigrants “has reached saturation level,” Sheahen said in court papers, arguing unsuccessfully that the case should have been moved out of the San Fernando Valley for Panah to receive a fair trial.

Sheahen points to what he called strong anti-Iranian feelings in American society, describing Panah in court papers as “a foreigner from the most loathed location on the planet, and clearly a member of a group which arouses community hostility.”

Prosecutor Peter Berman has disputed that argument in his legal response, pointing out that the Valley is ethnically diverse enough so that picking an impartial jury should not be difficult.

Panah is accused of luring the 8-year-old girl into his apartment, sodomizing her, strangling her and stuffing her nude, battered body in a suitcase left in his closet.

Nicole disappeared shortly after 11:45 a.m. on Nov. 20, 1993. She was last seen playing with a softball and mitt in the courtyard between her father’s apartment and Panah’s.

Her body was found in Panah’s closet about 24 hours later after a search staged from a command post at the Woodland Hills apartment complex.

Panah was arrested Nov. 21, after slashing his wrists and swallowing a bottle of sleeping pills in an apparent suicide attempt. He appeared at a former girlfriend’s apartment, saying he had “done something really bad” and she would be hearing about it, she told police. He also told her the missing child was dead, she said.

Adding to the emotional caldron is the fact that families of the victim and the defendant enjoy stature in their communities.

Panah’s mother, Mehri Monfared, has been her son’s staunchest defender. She has led efforts to establish a legal defense fund.

She produces a popular television show in Los Angeles for the Iranian community. The case has been featured prominently on Iranian television shows and the International Channel.

Lori Parker has worked as a paralegal and a legal secretary, and is engaged to marry prominent criminal defense attorney Martin Gladstein. “The community really has rallied around me,” she said, adding that she received 3,000 cards and letters after Nicole’s slaying.

Gladstein said that neither he nor Parker has enjoyed any special treatment from court staff. If they are sympathetic figures, it is “because Nicole was so young and so innocent.”

And if the case strikes a public chord, it is not because of issues of privilege or prejudice, he said. It is a matter of lost innocence, and a lost sense of safety.

“Everybody who has kids realized there is no place that is safe anymore. If it can happen to a little 8-year-old in a secured apartment complex in a nice part of town, it can happen to anyone,” he said.

“She was a defenseless, little tiny girl,” Parker said. “That’s where the emotion comes from . . . This is every parent’s worst nightmare.”