Carmona Gets 12-Year Sentence

Despite eleventh-hour efforts by his attorneys for a new trial, a Costa Mesa teen whose cause engendered the support of several community leaders was sentenced Thursday to 12 years in state prison for crimes some contend he did not commit.

Orange County Superior Court Judge Everett W. Dickey denied a new trial for Arthur Carmona, 17, after a lengthy afternoon hearing in which his lawyers argued there was insufficient evidence for the convictions, and that Carmona’s original attorney, Deputy Public Defender Kenneth Reed, did not explore exculpatory evidence during the trial.

“The court can’t really grant a new trial for the purpose of trying the whole thing again,” Dickey said. “No trial is ever perfect.”

The judge, who presided over the original trial, said Carmona received “adequate counsel” and that there was “sufficient evidence” to convict him.

Many in the packed courtroom let out sighs and groans as the judge announced his decision. A stunned and shaken Ronnie Carmona, the defendant’s mother, vehemently maintained her son’s innocence and said she worries what prison will do to him.

“They took a teenage boy and they are going to give back to me a criminal,” the 37-year-old Costa Mesa resident said, adding that she moved her family from Santa Ana five years ago because she did not want her son to get mixed up with gangs.

A jury convicted Carmona last October of two armed robberies committed two days apart in February 1998; a Costa Mesa Denny’s restaurant and a juice bar in Irvine.

However, a key eyewitness and a juror have since come forward expressing doubts about the case.

Casey Becerra, a Denny’s cashier who originally identified Carmona as the robber, said recently she only did so because police told her they had found incriminating physical evidence linking Carmona to the crime, including a gun, backpack, getaway truck and hat.

In actuality, no physical evidence has tied Carmona to the crimes, a fact that has haunted at least one juror in the case. The juror, who asked not to be identified, recently told The Times he has since been wrought with doubt. He said he gave in to what he felt was peer pressure from other jurors.

“The fact that so much was never tied to the defendant demonstrates that some points got lost during the trial,” said Carmona’s attorney, Mark Devore, during Thursday’s hearing.

Deputy Dist. Atty. Jana Hoffman, who prosecuted the case, called Devore’s assertions “Monday morning quarterbacking.”

“Every decision that [defense attorney Reed] made was a tactical one and based on his years as a trial lawyer,” Hoffman argued.

Carmona, in a neatly pressed white shirt and suspenders, sat quietly through most of the proceeding but broke down when witnesses were called to ask Dickey for leniency.

“Just keep your faith in God,” Stephanie Harrigan, Carmona’s teaching aid in the Santa Ana jail, told him from the witness stand.

Carmona raised his shackled hands to his eyes as his other attorney, Nadia Davis, consoled him.

Outside the courtroom, Davis, a Santa Ana school board member, said she was shocked by the ruling.

“It goes against everything I learned in law school about justice,” an emotional Davis said. “I just wanted to see a new trial. If he was convicted again, at least I’d know the system worked.”

Amin David, head of Los Amigos of Orange County, called Carmona’s case a litmus test for the justice system as it concerns Latinos in the county.

The prosecution showed a “deliberate attempt to win in spite of the truth,” said David, who was among many in the local Latino community who took up Carmona’s cause.

Carmona will be sent to the California Youth Authority, where he will remain until his 18th birthday, and serve the remainder of the sentence in state prison. He was also ordered to pay $2,200 in restitution. He faced a maximum sentence of more than 21 years in prison.

But Dickey said he was swayed by those who vouched for Carmona’s character.

“You have a lot of things going for you,” Dickey said.