Opinion ID: 1254168
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Events before December 29,1981.

Text: Deborah (Debbie) Garcia (then Deborah Chichiletti) met appellant in December 1979 in Kailua-Kona, Hawaii. She began dating appellant in or about January 1980. After she had lived for about two months in a house next door to him, appellant asked her to move into his house and assist with household chores. Appellant first told Garcia about the Mafia in January 1980, and stated that a lawyer he helped her retain for her divorce had helped appellant in his Mafia dealings. Before she moved in with him appellant asked Garcia if she knew anyone who could get large quantities of cocaine. At appellant's request she arranged, through an acquaintance, to purchase one pound of cocaine for $22,000. Appellant supplied the money and she flew to California to complete the purchase. Appellant told her that someone would be watching her on the plane and that she would be killed if anything went wrong. Due to an apparent misunderstanding, the contact had only four ounces of cocaine for which she was charged $2,200 an ounce. When she returned with only four ounces of cocaine, contrary to appellant's instructions, he said he would kill her within the week if she did not make up the difference between what had been paid and what he believed the crummy cocaine was worth. She borrowed money from a friend and gave it to him. From early 1980 to early 1981, while Garcia lived with appellant, he assaulted her at least six times, tried to strangle her, and poisoned her with adulterated cocaine. While she was hospitalized recovering from the poisoning, he hit her in the face during a visit. He said she opened her mouth too much, threatened her with his Mafia connections, and told her she was being watched. She knew the last was true because he knew exactly where she had been even when she had been all alone with no one around. She once thought about leaving and confided in Judith Lindquist, without knowing that Lindquist was appellant's former wife. Soon thereafter, apparently aware Garcia had spoken to Lindquist, appellant told Garcia that he would have Garcia's nephews or nieces killed if she tried to leave, would chop off her brother's head or cut his fingers off, and would hang her sister's child and her brother on meat hooks while forcing Garcia to watch. After her divorce, appellant had Garcia bring him as many firearms from the marital settlement as possible. She provided appellant with a .45-caliber Colt pistol and a .22-caliber derringer. Appellant buried the guns in an ice chest in the backyard with money and drugs. Later appellant brought home two Datonic .45-caliber guns. He said they were good killing guns and that the guns were not registered; they had come direct from the factory somehow. Appellant had a cowboy gun in his bedroom. Appellant repeatedly threatened to kill Garcia if she did not obey or left without his permission. He claimed to be one of seven men of respect in the country. He threatened to kill her family if she committed suicide. After she called a friend and discussed moving out, appellant repeated to her everything she had said on the phone, reminding her that the phone was tapped. He boasted that he was the biggest marijuana grower in Hawaii, and began using cocaine heavily in December 1980, even while he lectured Garcia about taking pills or drinking alcohol. He said she would be killed by the Mafia if she used drugs or alcohol, but later when she lived in his house he let her smoke marijuana with him and take cocaine. Toward the end of 1980, she saw him in possession of as much as a pound of cocaine at the Alii Drive house. Garcia met Weller in Hawaii in 1980. She first saw appellant using cocaine with Weller and Tonya Tate. Appellant forced her to apologize to his friends for her shortcomings. He also told her under the penalty of death to take care of Bennett Cleff to whom he claimed to be selling real estate under the name Central States Properties, sending her to a hotel where she engaged in degrading sexual acts with Cleff. She believed she or someone in her family would be killed if she did not comply with Cleff s demands. Appellant sent Garcia to California in March 1981. During the previous two months he had told her many times that he could or would have her killed. When he sent her back to California he told her he was doing so because the Mafia said she talked too much and had to be killed. He made an agreement with the Mafia to have her watched so she would not talk rather than killed outright. Appellant gave Garcia a package containing guns and told her to mail them to the mainland to be waiting for her on arrival. She mailed the guns with some of her clothing in a beer cooler provided by appellant. In California she retrieved the package and moved in with her mother as appellant had instructed. Appellant monitored her with frequent phone calls to her and her mother, and told her he had assigned someone to follow her. She never questioned appellant and followed his instructions to wait at phone booths for scheduled calls. Appellant told her she would be followed. She believed him because several times in Santa Cruz she saw a man whom appellant had asked to carry her bag onto the plane in Kona and who had been on the plane to San Francisco. On one occasion, she saw him near her mother's house. On another he was watching her. Appellant also instructed her to wait at a phone booth each Wednesday at 5:00 p.m. and called her there. In April 1981 appellant instructed Garcia to open the package of guns, which she had assumed contained her guns. Inside she found instead the Datonic guns and the cowboy gun. Appellant directed her to wipe down the weapons with a cloth and store them in the packing until someone arrived at her door using the code name Penguin and asked for the package. When she moved out of her mother's house, appellant directed Garcia to take the package back to her mother's house because Garcia could not be trusted. In October 1981 appellant visited Garcia and told her to date Donald Garcia, whom she had met earlier and to learn as much as she could about Donald Garcia's employer, an armored car service. He gave her Donald Garcia's Social Security number. In November 1981 appellant ordered Garcia to marry Donald Garcia so that he could more easily arrange to rob Donald Garcia's armored car. She married Donald Garcia on December 5, 1981. Appellant had then developed a relationship with Edwards. Garcia met de Laet in November 1981. Appellant had then returned to the mainland. At his direction Garcia took the Styrofoam container in which the guns were packed to the Corte Madera Inn in Corte Madera where she met appellant. Garcia drove appellant to the Jack Tar Hotel in San Francisco. He asked her for the keys to the car and they went to the cocktail lounge of the hotel. Appellant left. She remained in the cocktail lounge for about two hours. When appellant returned, the Styrofoam package was no longer in the car. She did not see the container again, but on December 29, 1981, on the university property at the Empire Grade Road, saw one of the Datonic guns it had held. Appellant and Garcia then returned to the Corte Madera Inn. It was late, but appellant was using cocaine and would not let Garcia sleep. De Laet and MacVicar arrived the next day at 11:00 or 12:00 a.m. Appellant introduced Garcia as Bebe, a name he had given her in Hawaii, but did not introduce Garcia to them. At that point she did not know their names. The three used cocaine and appellant told them he could get some really pure stuff. He ordered Garcia to leave the room while they talked, and when she returned about 30 minutes later, de Laet and MacVicar were gone. She next saw them on December 29, 1981. Garcia returned to Santa Cruz, but two or three days later, appellant ordered her to come to Millbrae. There he told her that two snitches had been killed, chained together, and dumped in 200 feet of water. Over the next two days in appellant's motel room, he repeatedly showed Garcia her death card, forced her to her knees, and made her pray to a picture of a man. Garcia again returned to Santa Cruz. Appellant continued to call her at a telephone booth, and in a December 1981 call ordered her to dig two holes in a remote area in which to bury two packages, and to purchase two sacks of quicklime. Because appellant had often buried guns and drugs in Hawaii, she assumed this was the purpose of the holes she was to dig. She dug the holes off Empire Grade Road on University of California at Santa Cruz property on or about December 26 or 27, 1981. She was familiar with the area because she was a member of the California Rescue Dog Association and had worked her search and rescue dogs there in the past. Later, not knowing what quicklime was, she purchased oyster shell gardening lime at a garden shop. [2] Shortly before December 28, appellant called Garcia and directed her to take him to the holes so they could bury the packages. She arranged to meet him at a doughnut shop near Highway 1. He did not give her any instructions regarding what she should wear or tell her not to use deodorants or perfume. He did not tell her that he was bringing anyone with him.