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LOS ANGELES (CNS) - A state appellate court panel Monday rejected a bid for re-sentencing by one of two men convicted of the murder of the owner of a Mar Vista medical marijuana dispensary during a robbery about 6 1/2 years ago.
James A. Eastland, now 27, was sentenced in 2019 to 40 years to life in state prison after pleading guilty to murder and robbery charges stemming from the Jan. 18, 2017, shooting death of Ovik Oganesyan, 50, at the dispensary at 12480 W. Venice Blvd., along with an unrelated robbery.
Superior Court Judge Curtis B. Rappe subsequently denied a petition for re-sentencing under state law that affects defendants in some murder cases.
"Reviewing the totality of this evidence, it was sufficient to support the trial court's conclusion that Eastland planned with his accomplice to shoot Oganesyan to facilitate the robbery," the appellate court panel found in its 19-page ruling.
Eastland's co-defendant, Kayshon Lamont Moody, now 31, is serving two consecutive life prison terms without the possibility of parole for the killings of Oganesyan and the shooting death of M.D. Mizu Rahman, 34, at a Chevron station in the 2100 block of North Vermont Avenue a day before Oganesyan was killed.
Eastland -- who testified during Moody's trial -- told jurors that Moody had talked with him about wanting to commit a robbery and told him he knew of a marijuana dispensary that didn't have a security guard. But he said he didn't realize they were going to rob the Golden State Dispensary until Moody informed him when they arrived at the rear of the building. He testified that he waited in the lobby until he heard gunshots, then ran toward a locked door, jumped through the shattered reception window and began grabbing jars of marijuana as Oganesyan pleaded for help.
Eastland said he didn't recall stepping over the mortally wounded man to get to the business' safe, but realized he had once he watched surveillance video of the crime.
Eastland -- who said he had known Moody for about five months before the killing -- said his friend subsequently directed him to rob a store to get more cash, with Moody saying he couldn't go into the business because people there knew him.
Eastland said the two subsequently drove to Las Vegas, where Moody shot at another motorist who chased after him following a rear-end collision. Prosecutors contended Moody also shot and wounded a man during an attempted carjacking soon after the crash, but he was not charged with any crimes in Nevada.
The two men were pulled over and arrested by Los Angeles police on Jan. 20, 2017, shortly after they returned to Southern California.
In her closing argument in Moody's trial, Deputy District Attorney Beth Silverman told jurors that no mercy was shown to the victims, who were "taken by surprise" and each shot in the back in acts of "gratuitous" violence in crimes caught on video, even though the victims were "compliant" and "submissive."
DNA evidence from a soda cup lid found at the scene of Rahman's killing and on a 9 mm Beretta -- the murder weapon that was found in the driver's side pocket of the Nissan Versa that Moody was driving when he and Eastland were arrested -- linked Moody to the killings, Silverman said.
Moody's driver's license, which was seen falling from his hands in the surveillance video at the marijuana dispensary -- was left behind at the scene, the prosecutor said, telling jurors there was a "mountain of evidence in this case."
Moody's trial attorney, Hui Kim, told jurors she understood they would feel sympathy for the victims, but asked them to "objectively determine" whether Moody was responsible for the killings. She urged the panel to question Eastland's testimony linking Moody to Oganesyan's killing, noting that he had acknowledged lying to detectives in the past and was "receiving a benefit for testifying."
"Someone who's motivated in that manner can't be trusted," Moody's lawyer told jurors.
In a statement read in court on her behalf by a family member at Moody's sentencing, Oganesyan's widow, Armik Iskandaryan, wrote that attending the court proceedings had given her "somewhat of the closure I need."
"I never got to say goodbye to him. That was taken away from me. Instead, I sat in this room watching videos of him being shot, seeing images that have forever changed me, and then was forced to go home and not have my husband to talk to," she wrote, noting that the couple would have celebrated their 25th wedding anniversary in 2018. "My husband, the father of my children and the love of my life, is not here with me today because he was ruthlessly shot."
In a June 2020 ruling, a three-justice panel from the 2nd District Court of Appeal found "overwhelming evidence" that Moody was guilty of first- degree murder. The appellate court justices noted that "the videos clearly showed Moody committing robberies and murders" and that "the evidence showed premeditation as well."
"His arrival at the crime scenes, armed with a loaded gun suggested pre-planning," the panel found in its 29-page ruling, adding that neither of the victims resisted him and that there was no evidence that he shot in a panic.
The California Supreme Court refused in August 2020 to review the case against Eastland.