Killer’s Penalty Trial Delayed Pending Stay

A judge Wednesday agreed to delay setting a new death-penalty trial for Robert Cruz McClain until next week in the hope that a federal appeals court would order the convicted killer back to San Quentin prison, absolving Ventura County of any responsibility in the case for now.

Deputy Dist. Atty. Michael Frawley said the federal stay order is expected to be handed down this week. The stay would freeze U.S. District Judge John G. Davies’ order that a new penalty phase be scheduled for McClain within the next nine months.

Davies last week threw out the death penalty for McClain, who has spent the last 14 years on Death Row. Davies said that Ventura County Superior Court Judge Lawrence Storch should have allowed a prison psychologist to testify during the death-penalty phase of McClain’s 1981 murder trial. The California attorney general has appealed that ruling to the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals.

McClain was sentenced to die for raping and fatally shooting 20-year-old Joni Donnell Kelley and dumping her body in a trash can near Santa Paula. He then drove to Solano County, where McClain, his nephew and a third man kidnaped, raped and slit the throat of a 31-year-old woman.