Opinion ID: 2815883
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The killing of Martin Campos

Text: Oscar Ross is the uncle of defendant‟s wife and a cousin of Brightmon.3 Ross owned a large parcel of property cluttered with junk and several trailers in Riverside County. Because of a prior shooting incident, Ross used a wheelchair. His caretaker, Margie Escalera, lived in a nearby trailer. Ross had been friends with Martin Campos and frequently purchased cocaine and marijuana from him. Ross would then resell the cocaine to other sellers. At one point, Ross suspected that Campos had arranged a robbery in which four or five Spanishspeaking men accosted Ross and Escalera at gunpoint, taking approximately $4,500 in cash, a few pounds of marijuana, and some household items. Ross did not confront Campos with his suspicions, but instead formulated a plan with defendant, who remained at large after the Lopez shooting, and Brightmon to steal cocaine from Campos. Ross planned to offer Campos $22,500 for a kilo of cocaine; upon delivery, he would confront Campos about the prior robbery and, using defendant and 3 Ross had originally been charged as a codefendant in the killing of Campos, but before trial he pleaded guilty to second degree murder and received a 15-year-to-life term. Ross agreed to testify truthfully in this case, and the prosecutor agreed to write a letter in support of placing Ross on parole when he became eligible. 5 Brightmon to intimidate him, take the cocaine without paying for it. Ross claimed he did not intend to harm or kill Campos. Ross contacted Campos and arranged for the delivery. The night before, defendant and Brightmon joined Ross and Escalera for dinner. That evening, defendant said that killing someone “comes easy.” The following morning, on November 11, 1995, defendant and Brightmon waited at Ross‟s property. Campos had purchased the kilo of cocaine from Jose Garcia, and Garcia drove him to Ross‟s property with the cocaine concealed inside the trunk of his white Nissan. When Campos and Garcia arrived, Ross was in the yard. To ease any suspicion, defendant and Brightmon pretended to rake the yard. Garcia parked his car, and Campos got out to speak with Ross near a U-Haul truck. Garcia got out of his car and approached the others. Ross asked to see the cocaine, and Campos told Garcia to get it. As Garcia walked toward his car, Ross was about to tell Campos “what was getting ready to go down” when defendant pulled out a handgun and pointed it at Campos, who was seated on the bumper of the U-Haul. Garcia saw what was happening and ran toward the gate. But Brightmon chased after and tackled him, dragging him back to the U-Haul truck. Ross, defendant, and Brightmon told Campos and Garcia to get inside the U-Haul. Campos refused, but was forced inside. Brightmon struck Garcia in the face, causing him to fall inside as well. Campos jumped out of the U-Haul truck and ran, with defendant and Brightmon giving chase. Defendant caught up with Campos and began struggling with him while Brightmon stood nearby. Ross saw Campos either break loose from defendant or be thrown to the ground, at which point defendant shot Campos with the handgun. Ross‟s caretaker, Escalera, also saw the shooting from her trailer window. 6 Garcia heard the shot and jumped out of the U-Haul truck into a nearby trash container. He briefly saw Campos slouched over with defendant standing about 10 feet in front of him. Campos said, “No, man. No, man,” and fell to the ground. Garcia jumped the fence and fled Ross‟s property. Campos tried to crawl on his stomach toward Garcia‟s car while defendant continued to stand over him with the handgun. Ross, defendant, and Brightmon searched Garcia‟s car for the cocaine, but could not find it. Meanwhile, Campos lay on the ground, still breathing, and looking at Ross. Ross believed that defendant and Brightmon placed Campos, while still alive, in the trunk of Garcia‟s car and closed the lid. Escalera, however, said that some unknown African-American men later arrived and lifted Campos into the trunk of a white car, and that the same men pushed that white car off Ross‟s property with another vehicle. After Campos was placed in the trunk, defendant ran toward the front gate, leaving Brightmon and Ross behind. Defendant encountered a resident of Ross‟s property, Ronnie Raynold Moore, who had heard the gunshot and was trying to drive off the property with his son. Defendant approached Moore‟s car with the gun pointed downward and said, “Don‟t go nowhere.” Defendant got in the passenger seat with his gun on his lap pointed toward Moore and told Moore to drive him off the property. Defendant directed Moore to drive around for 30 to 60 minutes. When defendant attempted to share his thoughts, Moore told him he did not want to hear anything. When defendant eventually told Moore to stop, he apologized, gave him $30, and left Moore‟s car. Ross drove Escalera and Brightmon out of the yard. He dropped Brightmon off and spent the night with Escalera at a cousin‟s home. After fleeing Ross‟s property, Garcia went to Campos‟s home and met his brother, Raul Campos. They searched for Campos and eventually found Garcia‟s car about a mile away from Ross‟s property. They drove it to Garcia‟s home and returned to Campos‟s 7 home where Raul called the police. Raul did not tell the police anything about the cocaine. Deputy Sheriff Michael Angeli, Garcia, and Raul investigated Ross‟s property. Deputy Angeli found fresh tire tracks left by a small car leading away from a locked gate. He also found drag marks with coagulated blood, blood spatter in the dirt near Ross‟s Cadillac, and blood at other adjacent locations. But Deputy Angeli found no dead or injured person on the property. The next morning, Garcia opened the trunk of his car and discovered Campos‟s dead body. He did not want to be blamed for Campos‟s death so he drove away from his home and dumped the body off the side of the road onto an embankment. A passerby eventually discovered the body and contacted the Sheriff‟s department. The forensic pathologist who performed an autopsy on Campos determined that he had died from a single gunshot wound that entered the right upper chest near the armpit. The bullet had struck and broken the fifth rib, then fragmented, perforated the right lung and heart, and passed between the back of the fifth and sixth left ribs. The pathologist believed Campos could have survived a minute or two before blood loss and aspiration of blood caused his death.
Defendant presented an alibi defense, claiming that he was in Oklahoma at the time of the Campos murder. Defendant‟s cousin, Francisco Trotter, and Trotter‟s girlfriend, Roberta McConnell, lived in Oklahoma. Between January and November of 1995, Trotter often socialized with defendant in Tulsa. Trotter and McConnell testified that defendant was at Trotter‟s apartment on the morning of November 11, 1995, the day Campos was killed. The day was memorable for Trotter and McConnell because it was Veterans Day, and they went to a cemetery to place a flag on Trotter‟s father‟s grave. 8 Brightmon testified and described the events leading to Campos‟s killing. In his version of events, defendant was not involved. Instead, Brightmon testified that Ross had asked Brightmon to stay and monitor the drug transaction with Campos as protection and gave him a revolver. After Garcia and Campos arrived, Ross and Campos spoke to each other in front of the car for a few minutes, and Brightmon noticed a truck driving into the area. Suddenly, Ross said something about a “jack” and, because Brightmon saw a group of Hispanic men running toward him, he took out the gun. Campos and Brightmon briefly struggled, and they both fell, causing the gun to fire, hitting Campos. Ross told Brightmon to help him “clean up this shit,” or he would be shot too. According to Brightmon, Ross told him to blame the shooting on defendant because Ross did not like him. Brightmon claimed he was scared of Ross because Ross had money to have people killed. During his testimony, Brightmon claimed he lied in his prior police statements, in which he blamed the shooting on defendant, in order to protect himself. When he and defendant were in custody for the present offenses, Brightmon sent a letter to defendant‟s attorney in which he offered to testify that he was the person who shot Campos.