Double-Murder Case Goes to Jury

The double-murder trial of Miguel Hugo Garcia was turned over Tuesday to the jury, which now must decide whether it was insanity or lust-fueled rage that drove him to kill a longtime friend and her ailing father last spring in Upper Ojai.

Garcia had wooed Helen Giardina on the night of May 22 with a dinner of sushi and wine, a gift of doves and a gilt-edged red-leather Bible, and the tribute of a rose and love note left on her pillow.

When she spurned him, prosecutors said, they argued so loudly that Albert “Jim” Alexander came out of his room to intervene, and picked up a gun.

Garcia then shot Alexander, 83, to death, and killed Giardina, 42, because she refused his advances and witnessed her father’s slaying, Deputy Dist. Atty. Robert Calvert said.

No one disputes that the 43-year-old La Crescenta furniture merchant was mentally ill when he fatally shot his good friends.

Instead, jurors must rule on whether Garcia was legally insane at the time--or not guilty by reason of insanity.

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Three psychiatrists testified that Garcia was indeed insane when he shot Alexander six times--once point-blank behind the ear--and fired 12 bullets into Giardina.

Garcia’s bizarre actions and delusional statements before, during and after the killings bolstered that diagnosis, defense attorney James Farley told jurors during closing arguments.

Seconds after the slayings, Garcia called 911, telling the operator that he had killed a devil and a demon to protect Giardina’s 3-year-old son, Jimmy, who he believed was the savior.

“He said [to police] that he wanted a party, a celebration for it because he thought it was right, that he was doing a good thing by killing those people,” Farley told jurors.

But Calvert told jurors during his closing argument that the psychiatrists “all said there is no way you can know for sure what’s in a person’s mind.”

“The law gives you a place to begin,” Calvert said. “The law says that all people are presumed sane, regardless of their crime, regardless of the killer, whether it’s Charles Manson, whether it’s the letter-bomb killer, whether it’s Jeffrey Dahmer. Mental illness is not the same as legal insanity.”

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Calvert said that pleading not guilty by reason of insanity requires Garcia to prove three things: That he did not know the nature of his acts. That he did not understand what he was doing. And that he did not know right from wrong at the time.

In fact, Calvert said, Garcia knew he was killing Giardina and Alexander and admitted as much in a 911 tape moments later--as well as in a taped interview with sheriff’s detectives.

Garcia also knew it was wrong because he then tried to blame it on someone else, whom he vaguely described as “a black man,” Calvert said.

“It’s not a man who was insane, it was a man who had mental illness, but he clearly knew that what he did was wrong,” Calvert concluded. “And he did it because he was in love.”

But Farley--who carries the burden of proving the not-guilty by reason of insanity plea--argued that Garcia was quite insane.

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Farley reminded jurors of Garcia’s statements on 911 and police interview tapes, in which he rambles and raves at length about God, demons and his own identity as a Muslim warrior named Rashid Ali.

“For some reason, Mr. Garcia had it fixed in his mind that [Giardina’s] 3-year-old boy is the savior,” Farley said. “He had it fixed in his mind that this 3-year-old boy was going to lead them into the 21st century,” and that Giardina and Alexander had become demons.

Garcia’s decline into mental illness last fall was marked by depression, threats to kill his family members and an assault on his own father who suffered a ruptured eardrum when Garcia punched him in the head, Farley said, recalling the evidence.

In another incident, Garcia ordered a cousin to pull down his pants, then threatened to run him through with an African spear when he refused.

He had bizarre encounters with police: During a speeding stop, he stuffed a boxed bottle of cognac against the grille of a CHP cruiser.

And during a Malibu traffic arrest, Garcia kicked out the window of a police car, had to be pepper-sprayed by deputies who subdued him, then spoke obscenely to a paramedic and shoved his head between her breasts.

Farley read messages to the jury that Garcia had scrawled atop a Styrofoam cooler lid found at the murder scene: “Bill Gates, Microsoft. I’m trying not to be so impatient. My cousin Freddy told me it was only temporary . . . Am I Jesus Christ? Yes. At 50 I will be Rashid Ali.”

Farley told jurors, “What happened to Mr. Garcia up there is he had a hallucination that the devil was there to harm Jimmy.

“He shot Helen Giardina 12 times to kill the devil, with two guns,” Farley said. “He shot Mr. Alexander six times with two guns. He said the devil told him to shoot him in the left ear, God told him to shoot him in the right ear and to use [Alexander’s] gun to do it.”

Farley said that in order to believe the prosecution theory that Garcia shot Giardina because she wouldn’t make love, the jury would have to believe that he had manufactured all of his strange behavior and remarks--back to September.

Instead, Farley said, “I ask you to return a verdict of not guilty by reason of insanity.”

Deliberations are to continue today.