Opinion ID: 1447881
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The Murder of Maxine Brown

Text: On November 15, 1984, the victim, Maxine Brown, drove to the Chatterbox Beauty Salon in Alhambra, County of Los Angeles, where she had a 5:30 p.m. appointment. The victim left the beauty shop about 6:45 p.m.; later that evening she was found dead in a church parking lot. Defendant lived at 705 Los Robles in Alhambra with his girlfriend, Mary Kimble, and a roommate, Helena Ringey. About 5:30 p.m. on the day of the killing, defendant borrowed Ringey's car. Kimble testified that before defendant left, he injected himself with cocaine, put his gun into his waistband, [1] and told Kimble that he was going to commit a robbery. That same evening, at approximately 9 p.m., Mark Velarde, who lived across the street from the First Baptist Church in Bassett, stepped out his front door when he heard sounds like firecrackers coming from the direction of the church parking lot. Velarde heard three shots that were fairly close together; there was a slightly longer delay, however, between the second and third shots than between the first and second shots. Crouched near the rear of a car parked in the lot was a shadowy figure, who then entered into the car's driver's side. The car screeched out of the parking lot. Velarde identified the victim's car that was depicted in court exhibit photographs as resembling the car that he saw leaving the church parking lot. Around 10 p.m., while on routine patrol, Deputy Donald Duffield of the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department discovered the victim's body lying prone in the parking lot of the First Baptist Church. Deputy Duffield described the dead victim as an elderly lady who was well dressed and [who] had a pool of blood on her chest. Later that night, defendant returned to the Los Robles address. Ringey testified that when defendant returned driving a different car, he had a fresh red stain on his shirt. Defendant said that a robbery he had committed that night didn't go as planned. Kimble testified that defendant told her that he had to kill a woman, and that he was alone at the time of the killing. Defendant later put a watch and a ring on the bed he shared with Kimble; Kimble pawned the ring and was wearing the watch when she was later arrested. The day after the shooting, defendant and Kimble used one of the murder victim's credit cards at Kinney's Shoe Store to buy a pair of boots for defendant.