A Pima County jury convicted Shawna Forde today of two counts of first-degree murder

[Ptah]

http://azstarnet.com/news/local/crime/article_6ae561fe-386c-11e0-9555-001cc4c002e0.html

A Pima County jury convicted Shawna Forde today of two counts of first-degree murder in the May 30, 2009 deaths of Arivaca residents Raul Junior Flores and his 9-year-old daughter, Brisenia.

The jury also convicted Forde of attempted first-degree murder in the shooting of Flores' wife, Gina Gonzalez, as well as related aggravated assault and robbery counts.

Gonzlez started crying as soon as the first guilty verdict, the killing of her daughter, was read just before noon in a packed courtroom at Pima County Superior Court.

The jury deliberated for seven hours over two days. Jurors will now be asked if the death penalty ought to be considered.



-----------------------------


Thank you jurors.

[L. Coyote]

1. Right on! Nine-year-old Brisenia Flores pleaded, "Please don't shoot me"

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=439x404927

[Mz Pip]

2. Good.

This country has no place for vigilantes.

[Dappleganger]

3. k&r

[ceile]

4. Good. K&R

[Lindsay]

5. Good news.

Thanks for posting it.

[annabanana]

6. good . . some justice. . . n/t

[ThomCat]

7. Good.

I hope she gets life in prison without any chance of parole, and I hope she has a very, very long lifetime in prison. Not only that, I hope it is a particularly unpleasant lifetime.

Hating entire classes of people out of pure racism, nothing but racism, and organizing people to join you because of it to go invading homes and shoot and kill an entire family? If she gets the death penalty after all of that then she's getting off far too easy, IMO.

[Lasher]

8. I hope they recommend the death penalty.

This monster should never be released to plague society again.

[toddwv]

9. Excellent.

Still barely a peep from the MSM...

[malaise]

12. And that is the worst part

Paris Hilton and Lindsay Lohan receive more coverage.
Nothing like covering up terrorism by the RWs

[toddwv]

16. I've posted the story a couple times in another poli forum that I haunt.

It got nothing but hate from the right-wingers there. Can't say that I'm surprised because I'm well acquainted with how some right-wingers view the world.

[tularetom]

10. Get a rope

These people believe in swift vengeful justice and who take it upon themselves to deliver it deserve nothing else.

Although I would like to see her sit her ass on death row for ten years or so and ponder her impending demise on a daily basis.

[a la izquierda]

11. K & R

Have fun in prison, you racist thug.

[mmonk]

13. Bravo.

[Starry Messenger]

14. Good.

[blondeatlast]

15. She'll be in a women's prison, surrounded by women placed there for lesser crimes*

who desperately want to be with their own children.

And I hope her colleague prisoners are made very, very well aware of what she'd there for and never let her live it down. I'm certain they will welcome her with such loving, open arms...

*She'll likely be housed with low-level drug offenders right up with murderers, AZ doesn't make such "delicate" distinctions, I'm afraid.

[Little Star]

17. Good.

[GSLevel9]

18. what a horrible crime.

The Gang leader woman, Shawna Forde is a hatemonger who was kicked out of the Minuteman group.

the shooter was a white man with connection to the Aryan Nation and had a long rap sheet including being a suspect in numerous murders.

The third person, Albert Glaxiola is a hispanic man with a history of drug offenses. He had a ongoing dispute with Gonzalez regarding Marijuana stored at the Flores house.

A DEA agent told the Arizona Star that Raul Flores was a drug trafficker.

So how many tragedies can we pile into one story?

Drug trafficker father endangering young daughter by his line of work, Aryan Nation hitman, Hateful racist and a drug dealing criminal planning a home invasion to steal money and drugs from the Flores house in part to fund Forde's new hate group.

To be honest... the only one I feel sorry for is the 9 year old girl. Any adult involved in drug trafficking knows what the risks are... the rest of them can all rot IMHO.

[blondeatlast]

19. Is there evidence that Raul Flores was suspected by LEGITIMATE authorities of drug trafficing?

According to what I've read, the crazy ass Minutemen planted the story to offer an "excuse" to invade the Flores' home.

Edit: crappy typing.

[GSLevel9]

20. It's from the AZ Daily Star, the local Tucson paper.

They quote a DEA agent interviewed. Subsequently, the authorities will neither confirm nor deny that Flores was a drug trafficker.

More info from the trial:

<snip>

The second of two FBI informants who claims he was recruited by Shawna Forde to rob drug cartel members testified Tuesday Forde never mentioned families when discussing her plan, contradicting the story of the other informant.

Forde, 43, is currently on trial in Pima County Superior Court on first-degree murder charges in the May 30, 2009, killing of Raul Junior Flores, 29, and his daughter Brisenia Flores, 9.

The Floreses were shot after a man and a woman claiming to be law enforcement officers demanded entrance into their home ostensibly to look for fugitives.

Prosecutors are attempting to prove Forde recruited a group of people to rob Flores of drugs, weapons and cash to fund her border protection group, Minutemen American Defense. Two co-defendants, Jason Bush, 36, and Albert Gaxiola, 44, are scheduled to be tried separately later this spring.

Forde's defense attorneys contend Forde is innocent and Gaxiola, Oin Oakstar and others plotted Raul Flores' death to rid themselves of competitors in the drug-trafficking business.

On Tuesday, Colorado bounty hunter and Minuteman Robert Copley testified he met with Forde at an Aurora, Colo. truck stop two weeks before the slayings. During that meeting, Forde wanted to know if he and his buddies were interested in robbing a drug cartel "staging area" in September.

There was no mention of families and no specific house was designated a target, although a map of Arivaca was drawn, Copley told defense attorney Eric Larsen.

He had no interest in Forde's scheme because it would have basically turned him into a drug dealer, Copley said. The FBI, informed of the meeting, told him to keep his "ear to the ground," he said.

Copley's account of the Colorado meeting contradicted, to some extent, that of Ron Wedow, who was also at the Colorado meeting.

Wedow testified last week Forde told them the Arivaca house she was targeting had $2 million to $3 million in cash and drugs stashed inside at any one time and the family that lived there was just "cover" for drug cartels.

<snip>

[blondeatlast]

21. So, bounty hunter FBI "informants" are the only source--and of course,

their pure and only interest is in justice. Please.

Spare me. If that's all the evidence, I find murdered Raul Flores innocent of the "charges" against him.

[GSLevel9]

22. Well...

my point is... I hate reading these threads because 1/2 of them say "Minutemen breaking into houses to kill brown people"

That's not correct.

Typical hyperbole.

It's a racist nasty monster and her Aryan Nation and drug dealer cohorts planning a robbery that they believed had a BIG cash and drug payoff. The 3rd suspect had former drug dealing with Flores and is the one who leaked the info to Forde that there was a stash of money/drugs there.

Btw, the police say that "not much" drugs or cash were found in the robbery. So it begs the question... did the 3rd suspect, Glaxiola lie to Forde because of a prior confrontation with Flores? Did Glaxiola owe Flores money?

It's just a tragedy... very sad. The little girl getting caught up in all these "adult issues"...

[GSLevel9]

23. Here's the strongest source, good enough for you?

The head of the Tucson office of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency, Anthony Coulson told the Arizona Daily Star, "Raul Flores was a drug-trafficker." Today, the DEA declines to comment on Mr. Flores.

And here's more of Coulson's comments:

<snip>
Anthony Coulson, head of the Drug Enforcement Administration's Tucson
office, said he thinks the girl's death resulted from a community failure.
"Raul Flores was a drug trafficker," Coulson said, noting that his
agency was actively investigating Flores as a central player in the
area's smuggling. "I think the majority of the people there are
sympathetic and tolerant of the trafficking that goes on."
<snip>

[blondeatlast]

24. Regardless, he should have had to face a jury of his peers--not

a crazed vigilante mob--and as an Arizonan, I've already seen way too much CYA (which I'm putting on the Fed and State authorities involved) and "he had it comin', too bad the little girl got in the way" here, there, and everywhere.

This was cold-blooded murder, no matter how it gets spun.

[GSLevel9]

25. you're right...

it WAS cold-blooded murder. No doubt, by definition.

But don't forget... the criminal underworld is a different world than where most of us live.

There is a constant level of danger involved. The door can come crashing in at any moment. You can be shot by a rival trafficker at any moment. What a terrible life.

Do you understand that if Coulson had ordered a raid on Flores house the day BEFORE the murders and arrested Mr and Mrs. Flores one of the charges could have been child endangerment?

If that door would have been crashed by 3 Mexican cartel members would we still hear about this story? Or is this story "news" because the ringleader was a racist pig and the shooter an Aryan Nation member?

No, he didn't "have it coming". That's not for me or any of us to decide.

EDIT: do you really refer to the 3 criminals as a "vigilante mob"? The reason why the Pima County didn't file any "Hate Crime" charges is that there was no evidence that the attack was motivated by anything other than drugs and money.