San Martin
– It’s as old as the judiciary itself. A prosecutor arguing for
murder; the defense pleading self defense.
San Martin – It’s as old as the judiciary itself. A prosecutor arguing for murder; the defense pleading self defense.
The case of 20-year-old Anthony Frausto is no different.
Friday, Santa Clara County Deputy District Attorney Stuart Scott told jurors that if they followed the letter of the law, they would return a guilty verdict for the charge of first degree murder, while defense attorney Andrew Tursi said testimony warranted a verdict of “not guilty” by reason of self defense.
Frausto is being held without bail in the Santa Clara County Jail in the shooting death of Luis Bautista, 19, of Gilroy on Sept. 5, 2005. Frausto went to the Morgan Hill Police Department three days after the shooting when his mother told him the police wanted to talk to him. He was arrested after an interview with MHPD detectives, during which he initially denied shooting Bautista, but later told them, “I did it,” police said.
After closing arguments, the jurors received instructions from Santa Clara County Superior Court Judge Kenneth L. Shapero late Friday afternoon, and the 12 jurors began deliberating just after 4pm. Shapero told them they would likely have time to choose a foreperson and get started with deliberations before stopping for the weekend just before 5pm. They will return to deliberations Tuesday morning.
Scott said Frausto’s actions warranted a first-degree murder conviction.
“Dressing in red is like bathing in fish oil and going abalone diving and getting mad at the sharks that bite you,” Scott told the jury, telling them that a decision that Frausto acted in self defense was not an option because of Frausto’s Norteño affiliations. “He made conscious choices that led to the murder of Luis Bautista at the age of 19 years and three months.”
But Tursi told jurors that a verdict of first degree murder, or even second degree murder, was not appropriate.
“Anthony did not start this fight, it came to him,” he said. “Bad decisions were made, but premeditated murder, no, no no.”
The homicide occurred about 9pm that Friday night, Frausto told jurors when he took the stand in his defense Wednesday. He and three friends were walking behind the JoAnn’s Fabrics store and the Safeway grocery store in Tennant Station shopping center to go to the Cinelux Theaters.
“If he went to a place where Sureños predominately hang out … then he’s looking for this,” Tursi told jurors Friday. “This confrontation just happened.”
During the week-and-a-half trial, Scott called 10 witnesses, while Tursi put only Frausto on the stand. Witnesses gave conflicting reports at times about the number of people in Frausto’s group, Norteños, and Bautista’s group, Sureños.
All agreed on the basic facts of the confrontation which led to the shooting. Frausto’s group was walking east, in the direction of the theaters, when a white pickup truck approached from the rear, and Bautista’s group got out of the truck.
The two groups faced each other and began walking toward each other, stopping about 10 feet apart in the parking lot area behind the stores. Each group began yelling gang slurs at each other; witnesses say the “trash talk” went on for 10 seconds to possibly 30 seconds before at least three shots were fired by Frausto, who had a .357 revolver in his waistband.
Frausto testified he got the gun from a friend to sell three days before the homicide, but decided to keep it because he “felt safe” with it.
The gang members fled, leaving Bautista. Two Sureño members returned to pick up Bautista, put him in the pickup and took him to Saint Louise Regional Hospital. He was later flown to Regional Medical Center, where he died from the gunshot wounds.
Scott reminded jurors that Frausto testified he was “living the life of a Northern warrior,” and told them that his actions in dressing in red, a color associated with the Norteño gang, arming himself and “putting himself out there” as a gang member warranted the first-degree conviction.
Tursi, reminding the jurors that Frausto had testified he felt “very afraid” because Bautista and others in his group had knives, said the perception that self defense does not apply to Frausto because of his gang activities is false.
“All of this nastiness sits on top of Anthony’s head because he’s the only one in the room that is a gang member,” he added.
Frausto’s mother, older sister, family and friends have been in the courtroom since the trial began, but have declined to comment. His godmother, Noel Furtado, said she wanted to comment Friday because she feels his true nature has not been made clear to jurors.
“He is a good person, very responsible, caring, very respectful,” she said. “This person (Scott) is portraying, that is not our Anthony … We realize he made mistakes, and he has to pay the price, but they are taking things way too far.”
Furtado also questioned why other gang members on both sides during the confrontation were not being held accountable.
“I would like to know why all these other kids aren’t being prosecuted for the same thing as Anthony,” she said. “Those Sureños, those other kids, they should all be going down with him.”
