PICO RIVERA — A woman convicted with her boyfriend of the stabbing murders of four members of her adoptive family as they slept in their home here nine years ago was sentenced Friday to 100 years to life in prison.
The four consecutive 25-year-to-life prison terms handed down by Norwalk Superior Court Judge John A. Torribio mark the third time that Monica Diaz — who was 16 at the time of the crime and is now 25 — has been sentenced for the murders.
Diaz’s aunt and adoptive mother, Sylvia Flores, survived the attack and was among those calling for the harshest possible sentence.
“I want her to get life — four life sentences. ... Nothing less. ... I fear for this community if she were to come out,” Flores told the judge.
During her trial in 2004, Diaz testified that she and her high school sweetheart, Michael Naranjo, agreed to stage a fake robbery at the home to draw her family closer because she believed her aunt and uncle were having marital problems.
Diaz acknowledged cutting duct tape for her then-17-year-old boyfriend so her family could be tied up. But she denied taking part in the stabbing deaths of her uncle, Richard Flores, 42, and cousins Richard, 17, Sylvia Jr., 13, and Matthew, 10, who were attacked in the early morning hours of July 21, 2000.
During her trial, the prosecution presented a March 1999 letter in which Diaz wrote to Naranjo that the “best job is to kill people professionally” — a missive that she testified was “just words.”
Naranjo pleaded guilty to the murders in October 2003 and was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.
Diaz was first sentenced in April 2004 to life in prison without the possibility of parole, but an appellate court panel reversed a special circumstance allegation of multiple murder, along with her conviction for the attempted murder of her aunt, Sylvia.
In its December 2005 ruling, the appellate court panel found the trial court “erroneously limited consideration of evidence that defendant thought her boyfriend would only frighten the people inside the house by pretending to rob them and did not know of his plan to kill.”
Prosecutors opted not to re-try the attempted murder count or the multiple murder allegation.
She was re-sentenced in April 2007 — that time to four consecutive 25-year-to-life terms. But a three-judge panel from the 2nd District Court of Appeal ruled that a lower court judge should have granted a continuance to allow Diaz’s attorney more time to prepare.
In arguing against the four consecutive 25-to-life sentences, defense attorney Richard Everett argued that Diaz would never be entitled to parole and that the sentence would constitute “cruel and unusual punishment” for a young woman who was “immature, both physically and mentally,” at the time of the killings.
He urged the judge to impose the 25-to-life terms concurrently rather than consecutively, while noting there was “certainly no assumption that she would be paroled” even if she became eligible.
Deputy District Attorney John Lewin countered that Diaz should “pay for each and every one of those lives” by serving the prison terms consecutively.
“It would be so much easier to understand ... if she had been abused and mistreated and unloved. ... It’s not there,” Lewin said.
The prosecutor called Naranjo “a disturbed, depraved, evil individual,” and said Diaz was “well aware of that.”
“She knew what Michael Naranjo was — he was a dangerous weapon and what she did was that she took that weapon and used it to further her means,” Lewin told the judge.
Sylvia Flores said her whole life was turned upside down when her husband, two sons and daughter were “brutally murdered.”
“All I’ve got is memories. I don’t have my kids or my husband,” Flores said.
In a letter read by a friend, Sylvia Flores’ oldest daughter and only surviving child, Esperanza, wrote, “How could my sister, my own flesh and blood, betray our family? ... Monica does not deserve the freedom she so carelessly took away from my family.”
Calling it the “most horrific situation I’ve been involved in,” the judge noted that the family had opened their door to Diaz and her half-sister after their mother died and treated her like their own.
The judge said he believed there was “no other sentence that is appropriate other than four consecutive life sentences,” noting the victims were “massacred in their own home” and that the crimes should be “punished individually.”