A 36-year-old man who was once sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole was freed Friday after serving more than 22 years in prison for participating in a kidnapping that led to a police chase in which the officers were fired upon but escaped injury.
Antonio Nunez was convicted in April 2003 of attempted murder on a police officer, conspiracy and kidnapping with sentencing enhancements for shooting a gun and gang activity. The crime spree occurred over three days in April 2001, according to court records.
The life without parole punishment was overturned on appeal, but the Orange County Superior Court judge sentenced him to 175 years to life in prison, and that was also overturned on appeal based on the defendant’s age and because he was convicted along with an adult at the time — co-defendant Juan Diego Perez, who was 27 at the time.
Orange County Superior Court Judge Jonathan Fish on June 6 ruled in favor of Nunez’s attempt to have that sentence also overturned based on new laws. Fish also transferred the case to Orange County Superior Court Judge Lewis Clapp to consider a transfer of the case to Juvenile Court.
Because Nunez is too old to be incarcerated under the jurisdiction of the Juvenile Court he was sent to a behavioral health facility that specializes in helping its live-in clients reintegrate back into society.
“I’m thrilled that this extraordinarily unjust conviction was vacated and it is now being handled in Juvenile Court,” Nunez’s attorney, Brian Gurwitz told City News Service. “Under the law that existed at the time the judge was allowed to give him life without the possibility of parole for a crime in which nobody was injured.
“That was an insane result, and to my knowledge, was the only time that’s ever occurred in the United States. Fortunately, today, the law is such that at a 14-year-old boy would never be tried as an adult for a crime like this and the Juvenile Court’s jurisdiction would expire when the person was in their 20s.”
Nunez’s previous attorney, Joel Garson, was also pleased with the outcome.
“This case has been eating at me since Antonio was convicted so many years ago,” Garson said. “It was an unjust sentence and the court of appeal agreed twice, and he languished for 20 years in prison before justice was finally served. It’s a weight off my conscience that he’s finally gotten out.”
According to one of the appellate court rulings, Nunez met Perez at a party and Nunez agreed to a kidnapping plot.
The two “armed themselves with an AK-47 and other guns, surprised a two-vehicle convoy of illegal immigrants, surrounded and fired their weapons at one of the vehicles as it sped away, and kidnapped the driver of the other vehicle, Delfino Moreno,” according to the ruling reversing the 175 years to life sentence.
“Nunez fired a handgun at the departing van, held the gun to Moreno’s head while he and a partner forced Moreno into a waiting vehicle, and kept a gun pointed at Moreno while holding him hostage overnight,” the justices wrote in the ruling.
The ransom demands, however, “went awry,” and it ultimately led to a police chase, the justices wrote.
“Investigators later found bullet holes in the front hood, the right doorframe, the right side-view mirror, the roof, the front push bar, and the overhead lights of the pursuing officers’ vehicles,” according to the appellate ruling.
“One shot had struck within a foot of one officer’s head and another within four to six inches of a different officer. Moreno had been handcuffed and sitting in the backseat of Nunez’s vehicle during the chase, and one of Nunez’s gunshots blew out the back window above Moreno’s head.”
Nunez testified during trial that Moreno “hatched the alleged kidnapping as a ruse to extort a ransom from his smuggling operation cohorts,” the justices wrote.
Nunez claimed he didn’t help with the abduction and that he shot at two unmarked undercover officer vans because he believed they were “narcos” from the “smuggling underworld” who were following them and were going to attack them, the justices wrote. Also, Moreno had ordered him to open fire, the justices wrote.
According to court papers, Nunez grew up in a dangerous neighborhood in South Los Angeles, where it was not uncommon to hear gunfire and his mother would have her children hit the deck to protect themselves.
There was also violent domestic disputes between his parents and he was verbally and physically abused by his alcoholic father, according to court records. Nunez graduated from a Drug Abuse Resistance Education program when he was in elementary school and said then he wanted to grow up to be a police officer, according to court records.
But Nunez joined a gang at age 12 and essentially the worst crime he committed was graffiti vandalism.
In September 1999, Nunez was shot when he was 13 years old during a gangland shooting. He was riding his bicycle near his home at the time.
His 14-year-old brother, Jose, heard his younger sibling cry out so he ran to his aid, but Jose was shot in the head and killed during the attack.
A doctor later diagnosed Nunez with post-traumatic stress disorder from being shot and seeing his brother’s killing.