Marine Recalls Day He Was Shot 5 Times

Facing the woman prosecutors say hired a hit man to kill him, an El Toro Marine testified in court Thursday how he managed to survive an ambush in an elementary school parking lot in Tustin last year.

Sgt. Johnny Rivera said he had agreed to meet his ex-wife, Debra Paredes, at the school in January 1997 to discuss visitation with their two children. Instead of meeting her, Rivera was confronted by a man in a ski mask holding a .357 revolver.

“From out of nowhere, a man came up from behind me and said, ‘Hey, cuz (street for cousin),’ ” Rivera testified. “I turned around, and he pointed a gun to my head. He started firing, but I ducked, and the first round missed me.”

Rivera, 39, said he began rolling on the ground as the man fired at him, hitting him five times.

“He just unloaded the gun on me,” Rivera said. “I pretended I was dead.”

After the gunman fled, Rivera managed to run a half-block for help and was taken to the hospital. He underwent surgery and still awaits another operation to have the last bullet removed, he said.

Prosecutors in the murder-for-hire trial say the Tustin woman wanted Rivera killed to collect a $200,000 life insurance policy in which one of their two daughters was named a beneficiary.

Prosecutors say she hired Marc Garric Johnson of Jackson, Miss., to carry out the job.

Johnson was arrested shortly after the shooting as he ran back to a nearby motel Paredes had checked him into earlier in the day. Officers responding to the report of shots fired saw him running from the direction of the school.

Johnson has pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit murder and attempted murder and is scheduled to be sentenced next week. He is expected to testify against Paredes on Monday.

The woman’s attorney said his client hired Johnson to scare her ex-husband, whom she accused of physical abuse and rape on numerous occasions.

She complained to his military superior in the days leading up to the shooting but made no police reports, according to court testimony.

“She had been abused during the marriage, and she had been abused after the marriage,” defense attorney Brian Galloway told the jury. “There was no agreement for a murder. It was to confront this man and get him to back off.”

Galloway also said Johnson agreed to testify against his client in order to get a lighter sentence. The trial is being held in Orange County Superior Court.