A state appeals court panel Tuesday upheld the murder conviction of a man who told police that he touched his girlfriend “with the love of God” inside a Burbank home where they had been staying.
The three-justice panel from California’s 2nd District Court of Appeal rejected the defense’s contention that there was insufficient evidence to support Timothy Aguilar Andrade’s first-degree murder conviction for the August 2015 attack on Brandi Carrasco, who was stabbed once in the neck and once in the shoulder.
In their 20-page ruling, the justices cited evidence of planning, a “preconceived design to kill” and a “volatile relationship” between the two.
The panel noted that Andrade initially denied knowing the 35-year-old victim and subsequently told police, “I touched her with the love of God.”
At the suggestion of one of the police officers, Andrade wrote the woman’s family a note that stated in part, “Because it was God’s will out of faith, hope and love, I sent her home. I touched her deeply with the hand of God … I am right with the Lord now, and hopefully I’ll be with her soon,” according to the ruling.
Andrade — who lived in Hesperia in San Bernardino County — was sentenced in June 2019 to 26 years to life in state prison.