Gang Member Gets Life, No Parole, for Killing Store Owner

A Santa Paula gang member convicted in the 1998 robbery and shooting death of a grocery store owner was sentenced Tuesday to life in prison without the possibility of parole.

Alfredo Hernandez, 23, sat quietly in his jail blues as Superior Court Judge Ken Riley handed down the sentence without comment. His lawyer, James Farley, asked the judge in vain for a new trial, then promised to appeal the case.

The victim’s husband, Eligio Regollar, watched the sentencing, and afterward said he believes the justice system worked.

“Even though my wife isn’t going to return, I’m happy because he is not going to be outside and free,” he said.

Farley contended that Hernandez is innocent, saying the prosecution’s case relied on the testimony of a co-defendant seeking to save his own life.

A jury convicted Hernandez in November without any physical evidence linking him to the crime, Farley said. The jurors were convinced of his guilt after the testimony of accomplice Jose “Pepe” Castillo and his girlfriend, as well as a police informant.

Castillo avoided the death penalty for his role in the holdup by agreeing to testify against Hernandez. Castillo admitted planning the holdup and shooting Mirna Regollar in the back but said Hernandez shot her in the head first.

Castillo is expected to be sentenced later this week.

“There was absolutely no corroborating evidence tying Fred to any kind of crime,” Farley said. “All we have is the co-defendant who is testifying against his friend to avoid the death penalty.”

In a two-page, handwritten note to Riley dated Jan. 1, Hernandez proclaimed his innocence.

“The only thing I’m guilty of is choosing the wrong set of people to befriend,” Hernandez wrote. “I cannot see how I am going to be put away behind what [a] liar is saying.”

Deputy Dist. Atty. Don Glynn, who prosecuted both men, said he is happy to see the case coming to an end.

“This is a case that has been going on for a long time,” Glynn said. “It’s good to have these cases resolved.”

Mirna Regollar was a 25-year-old mother of two small children when she was killed in the June 2, 1998, holdup. She and her husband owned Junior’s Market on Oak Street in Santa Paula. She was also taking nursing classes at Ventura College.

Castillo testified that Hernandez, a friend and fellow gang member, had been living in the garage of his family’s home. Castillo said he asked him to help rob the market to get money for drugs and gave Hernandez a loaded .22-caliber revolver.

The robbery went awry, Castillo testified, when the two men saw Regollar press a silent alarm as she opened the cash register.

Regollar’s killing led to Castillo’s conviction in the 1993 stabbing death of Ventura High School athlete Jesse Strobel. Strobel had been walking home from his father’s pizzeria in Ventura when he was attacked by a carload of teenagers, with Castillo wielding a knife.

Police were stumped until late 1998 when a police informant, a former acquaintance of Castillo and Hernandez, implicated them in the Regollar case and Castillo in Strobel’s death. Castillo pleaded guilty in the Strobel slaying and was sentenced to less than four years because he was only 15 at the time of the killing.