Nevada handyman convicted of 2015 killing of 81-year-old California man – East Bay Occasions
A Nevada handyman was convicted Tuesday of killing an 81-year-old man who was strangled six years ago in the bedroom of a Newport Beach home.
An Orange County Superior Court jury found Anthony Thomas Garcia, 62, guilty of first degree murder for the April 11, 2015 slaying of Abelardo Lopez Estacion.
The jury, however, found the killing was not carried out for financial gain. Such a determination would have made it a special circumstances murder, which would have led to a likely sentence of life without the possibility of parole.
The conviction comes less than a year after another jury was unable to reach a verdict, leading to a mistrial and a second trial. The second trial was delayed several times mid-testimony after Garcia was placed in temporary quarantine due to being exposed to other jail inmates who tested positive for COVID-19.
The killing came in the midst of an ugly fight over the estate of Dortha Lamb, Estacion’s dying wife. Garcia was the former boyfriend of Lamb’s granddaughter, and two of Garcia’s daughters were Lamb’s great-granddaughters.
At the beginning of Garcia’s latest trial, Deputy District Attorney Seton Hunt told jurors that the case was about “family, greed, hatred and deception.”
Lamb – a self-made woman who owned valuable real estate in Newport Beach, San Clemente and Costa Mesa – had been with Estacion for more than 20 years, but only married him shortly before his death. At the time of Estacion’s slaying, Lamb was dying from terminal cancer and suffering from dementia.
According to testimony during the trials, Garcia and some of Lamb’s relatives believed that Estacion was abusing Lamb and taking advantage of her health issues to siphon money from her accounts. Garcia had told others that he wanted to kill Estacion, according to testimony.
A legal battle broke out, with Lamb’s family taking her from her Newport Beach home and trying to get Estacion kicked out of the residence and barred from contacting Lamb. A judge delayed a decision on whether to approve a temporary restraining order against Estacion.
Hours later, someone entered the Newport Beach home, cut power to the residence, and then smothered, struck, and strangled Estacion.
Prosecutors allege that Garcia drove from Carson City to Newport Beach to kill Estacion, then immediately drove back. They say he left his cell phone with his adult daughter, Samantha Garcia, to make it look like he was still in Nevada.
Samantha Garcia initially told investigators that she had her father’s cell phone the night of Estacion’s killing and carried out a fake text conversation between the two of them. But during both trials the daughter recanted those claims, alleging detectives pressured her to lie and saying she didn’t have her father’s cell phone that night.
During the trials, Garcia’s attorney, Alisha Montoro, described Garcia as a non-violent, devoted family man who lived a simple life. The defense attorney denied that Garcia believed his daughters were entitled to Lamb’s money, and told jurors that Garcia wasn’t even in California the night of the killing.
Garcia is scheduled to return to court for sentencing on April 28. He faces up to 25 years to life in prison.
