Robber Guilty of Murder in Accomplice’s Slaying by Police

Accepting an unusual legal theory from prosecutors, a Ventura County jury Tuesday convicted an armed robber of first-degree murder in the death of his cohort, even though Los Angeles police officers fired the fatal shots during a gun battle in Newbury Park.

Robert Wayne Cunningham, 33, of Reseda, was held responsible for Daniel Soly’s death because he provoked the gunfight with police during a June 1995 robbery at the South West Liquor and Deli.

Officers from the LAPD’s Special Investigations Section, using a much-criticized tactic, followed the pair into Ventura County and watched them commit the robbery before trying to arrest them. In the ensuing shootout, officers killed Soly, whose back and head were riddled with 27 bullet wounds.

Two female jurors, who held out during nearly four days of deliberations, said they had problems convicting Cunningham of Soly’s murder.

“For all of us the murder conviction was very hard to come by,” said one woman, who declined to give her name. She cried as the verdicts were being read. “I don’t think any of us liked or were happy with our decision.”

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The other holdout, who also declined to identify herself, agreed, but said she felt the convictions were fair.

“I couldn’t find anything in the defense’s argument to use to sway the others,” she said.

When Cunningham took the stand, he told jurors that a member of the Special Investigations Section who never identified himself walked up to the getaway car and fired a single execution-style shot to Soly’s head.

Prosecutors gave a different version, saying Cunningham started the fight by popping out of the car’s sunroof to fire four shots at the undercover officers.

Defense testimony dwelt on the controversial record of the special unit. While on the stand, one officer said the unit’s detectives have killed 19 people and wounded others during their surveillance operations.

Deputy Public Defender Gary Windom argued that jurors should acquit Cunningham to send a message to the Los Angeles Police Department that the special unit should be disbanded. After Tuesday’s verdicts, he called members of the unit vigilantes.

“The true murderers in this case are walking out of the courtroom today,” Windom said. “That unit must be stopped.”

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Cunningham, who is paralyzed from the waist down from injuries he received during the shootout, was also convicted of seven other counts, including three charges of attempted murder. He faces a minimum of life in prison without possibility of parole because the first-degree murder conviction included a special circumstance.

His mother, Eileen, sobbed into a tissue while the verdicts were read. Her only comment was to refer to members of the LAPD unit as “a bunch of pigs.”

Charles Douglas of Sun Valley, a family friend who said he has known Cunningham since he was 11, said police should have identified themselves outside the liquor store.

“They didn’t say ‘police, police’ or nothing,” he said. “I think they are a bunch of assassins.”

Outside the courthouse, a third juror, a woman who declined to give her name, said the decision to convict was a hard one, but she felt it was justified.

“I’m not saying I didn’t have any feelings,” she said, gesturing at the two women who had held out for nearly four days before deciding to convict, both of them still wiping their eyes. “There just wasn’t enough there to get him off.”