Rapist Sentenced to 157 Years to Life

Proclaiming his innocence to the end, a convicted serial rapist was sentenced on Friday to 157 years to life in prison for robbing and raping four women in the San Fernando Valley, prosecutors said.

Just as he had told a probation officer preparing a sentencing report, Jose Luis Zarate told Superior Court Judge Darlene Schempp that the victims were mistaken and that he was innocent.

“I don’t know how the jury found me guilty,” he told a probation officer. “I am innocent of all charges and I have filed an appeal.”

Deputy Dist. Atty. Margo Childress had requested the maximum penalty against Zarate, 28, who abducted, raped and robbed the women, all Latinas, at gunpoint in a three-week period around Christmas 1996.

Schempp granted the prosecutor’s request, sentencing Zarate to 25 years to life for raping each woman and an additional 57 years and eight months for repeated rape acts, robberies and kidnappings.

Three of the victims--who have followed the case and were present during the verdict--addressed the court before sentencing and asked for the maximum penalty.

All four women were attacked during the early morning hours between Dec. 22, 1996, and Jan. 6, 1997. One woman was walking to work, one was getting into her car to drive to work, another was forced off the road at gunpoint and the last was raped as she washed clothing at a coin laundry.

For one of them, attending the hearing was not only emotionally painful, but also a physical challenge. Five days earlier, she had been in the hospital giving birth to her first child. Childress said the woman brought the baby to court.

Her testimony during the trial had been particularly moving, as she told jurors that she thought she knew fear until the rapist attacked her at gunpoint.

When a prosecutor asked her to identify her attacker, she sobbed and addressed Zarate directly, telling him: “I could recognize you anywhere.”

She has said that his conviction meant so much to her because she thought he would never be caught.

Zarate was arrested after police realized they were dealing with a serial rapist who preyed on Latinas in their early 30s. In January, they asked the victims to spend a day with a sketch artist so a composite could be released to the public. Investigators also released the tag number of the stolen Dodge Neon he was driving.

On Jan. 9, two days after they issued the news release, an anonymous caller led police to Zarate. He was arrested in a San Francisco motel.

Police recovered credit cards and other personal things that belonged to the victims at the motel and from a former acquaintance of Zarate’s.

Jurors deliberating at his trial said the evidence was overwhelming that he had attacked the four women.

They acquitted him of charges of attacking a fifth woman because, although they believed he had done it, there was not enough evidence to prove it.