Jury Finds Killer Was Insane

A woman with a long history of mental illness who was convicted of repeatedly running her car over an elderly Latino man she called “road kill” was found to be insane Tuesday by a Los Angeles jury after only four hours of deliberation.

Marie Elise West, 41, will be sentenced to a state mental hospital for killing 65-year-old Jesus Plascencia in the parking lot of a Van Nuys bagel shop six years ago. A judge will determine the length of her stay at a hearing Sept. 7.

“The jury has made its decision,” said Sandi Gibbons, spokeswoman for the district attorney’s office. “We felt very strongly she was not insane at the time but the jury saw the evidence differently.”

After the verdict was read, Roger West, the defendant’s father, hugged and shook hands with each juror as they left the courtroom, tears welling in his eyes.

“We saved her life from the system,” he said outside the courtroom.

West’s mother, Geraldine West, added, “I’m relieved. Prison would have been like a death sentence. She couldn’t have survived that.”

During the trial, the prosecutor argued that the crime was premeditated and described the defendant as a coldblooded killer. After driving over Plascencia a third time, West casually bought a bagel and told an employee that there was some “road kill” in the parking lot.

The Hermosa Beach woman, who witnesses said shouted several racial epithets at the scene, became the first person in Los Angeles County to be charged under a state law that permits capital punishment for a hate-crime slaying. But prosecutors decided not to seek the death penalty against West, who had been hospitalized multiple times since being diagnosed with manic depression.

Jurors convicted West of second-degree murder in November 2004 but deadlocked on whether she was sane. They also rejected the hate-crime charge against her.

The latest trial began July 26.