Yellow Beard: California has a moratorium on executions. The guy isn't really facing the death penalty.

Perhaps not, but he'll still be placed on Death Row, won't he?  It's not like his prison sentence will put him in general population with some kind of potential to build even an in-prison life for himself.

If what he's accused of is true then this seems like a fair result.  Even if the business partner's actions invited retribution, killing the children was particularly heinous.  The children did nothing to him in the slightest.  Killing those one has literally no quarrel with provides justification for the death penalty simply because one willing to do that can never be trusted to be a part of society ever again, no rehabilitation is possible.

indy_kid: FTA:  "I can tell you right now our client is innocent, and we will fight and continue to fight as long as we have to, continue to get paid by the family." said attorney Raj Maline.

FTFRaj.


/A HS classmate is a criminal defense lawyer in CA
//Got a hung jury for a client last summer
///Family ran out of money, so they had to use a public defender in the retrial
////Found not guilty

Assuming that the work of the paid attorney was turned over to the public defender, and assuming that the previous trial informed that public defender on what needed to be concentrated upon and what could be basically just rehashed or glossed-over, then this isn't a surprise.  Could also be that evidence or testimony that the judge ruled as inadmissible or irrelevant after it was presented was still considered by jurors that had voted to convict, and on retrial those might have been entirely excluded, not prejudicing the jurors.