On the third anniversary of the victim’s stabbing death, a former Fresno State University student was sentenced Friday to life in prison without the possibility of parole for killing a UCLA student whose body was found after a fire at her Westwood apartment that he set to cover up the crime.
Alberto Hinojosa Medina, now 25, was convicted May 29 of first-degree murder for the Sept. 21, 2015, slaying of Andrea DelVesco, along with the special circumstance allegation of murder during the commission of a burglary.
Jurors also found him guilty of one count each of arson of an inhabited structure and cruelty to an animal — the latter involving DelVesco’s dog, which had to be euthanized, along with two counts of first-degree burglary with a person present involving DelVesco’s apartment in the 10900 block of Roebling Avenue and another apartment across the street.
Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Mark E. Windham called Medina’s crimes “truly monstrous.”
“He brutally murdered a beautiful, innocent person. He seriously wounded an entire community,” the judge said. “He must never walk free again.”
The Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office had earlier decided against seeking the death penalty against Medina, who was arrested five days after the killing.
“How can I convey to you a loss beyond words?” the victim’s mother, Leslie DelVesco, said, calling her daughter “her bright light.”
“Andrea brought love and joy and happiness to me every day of my life from the second she was born,” her mother said. “I will miss her every day because of the heartless, brutal actions of Alberto Medina … That he is being sentenced on September 21st is a statement from a higher power.”
As photo slides of the victim were shown on a large courtroom screen, friends and fellow Pi Beta Phi sorority members spoke about the loss of a young woman who brought joy to their lives and urged the judge to impose the maximum sentence on the man convicted of killing the 21-year-old Austin, Texas, woman, who was entering her fourth year at UCLA. She was studying psychology and Spanish in hopes of becoming a bilingual psychologist.
Some said her murder marked the end of a time of innocence and made them worried about their own safety.
Erika Friesen told the judge that she “held on to a glimmer of hope” that DelVesco and her dog were still alive after the fire, and never imagined that she would hear that her friend had been stabbed 19 times and that her room had been lit on fire.
“She was everyone’s best friend,” said another woman, Josslyn Fahrni, who described DelVesco as living on “in videos, photos, my head, my heart.”
“Will I ever forget her? Absolutely not,” she said. “I hope she has found peace even if none of us has.”
Elizabeth Matusov, a close friend and former roommate, said she was “forever devastated” by the loss of the “brightest soul to ever touch my heart.”
Another friend, Amir Ghowsi, said, “He took away the biggest heart I’d ever encountered.”
He said family members had hoped that her dog, Shay Panda, would be able to be saved, but her beloved pet was in “unbearable pain” and had to be euthanized in the hours after DelVesco’s death.
Deputy District Attorney Victor Avila told the judge that the defendant hadn’t “shown any remorse for any of this.”
Medina’s attorney, Debra Werbel, countered, “He did not enter this home planning on killing Andrea DelVesco.”
She said her client was drinking that night and had “lived for 21 years … as a good person,” telling the judge that “we are never going to know exactly why this happened.”
Medina did not speak during the sentencing hearing.
During his opening statement in Medina’s trial, the prosecutor told jurors that DelVesco’s ” life was taken away from her by this defendant … He stabbed her multiple times to silence her so she could not call out for help.”
Avila said the woman’s dog was discovered by firefighters at the foot of her bed after being “silenced” — an allegation the defense attorney disputed.
Medina, who had come to the area to visit a friend who attended UCLA, subsequently drove his red 2010 Nissan Sentra back to Fresno, where he lived with two roommates, the prosecutor said.
Los Angeles police were notified when one of Medina’s roommates tried to register a speaker that had been taken along with a laptop computer during the first Westwood burglary, and police subsequently went to Fresno, where they recovered items containing DelVesco’s DNA at the residence, Avila said.
Co-defendant Eric Marquez, 25, was attending UCLA when he was charged with murder and two counts of first-degree burglary with a person present, but subsequently pleaded guilty to one count each of first-degree burglary and being an accessory after the fact. He was sentenced in June to two years and eight months in prison, according to the District Attorney’s Office.