Three members of the Aryan Brotherhood were found guilty of rackets in a trial Friday, which showed five murders were planned from prison on the streets of Los Angeles County.
Three days after deliberation, Fresno’s federal jury found Kenneth Johnson, 63, Francis Clement, 58, and John Sting, 70, 20, the jury found Kenneth Johnson, 63, and Francis Clement, 58, and John Sting, 70, the jury, after deliberation three days. John Stinson. Life and death of white prisoners in the California prison system.
“They are elites,” said Stephanie Stokman, an assistant U.S. attorney, in his closing remarks. “They ruled fear and power.”
In addition to extortion, Clement and Johnson were also guilty of ordering the murder of Alan Rosansky and Ruslan Magmodgazhiev, who were in Lomi on October 4, 2020 The tower was shot.
Johnson’s attorney said she would appeal the verdict but declined to comment further.
Clement also was convicted of ordering Michael Brizendine for murder, who was in Lancaster and James Yager Jr. on February 22, 2022 James Yagle Jr. and Ronnie Ennis Jr.
To explain how and why the five men died, prosecutors summoned witnesses to a parade of admitted murderers, thieves, liars and shakedown artists who testified in exchange for leniency in their own case. They said the victims “disrespected” the Aryan Brotherhood or its rules.
According to the witnesses, the convicted Pimp Rosansky failed to cut down on fraudulent rackets on Johnson and Clement. His friend Magomedgadzhiev was killed as he accompanied Roshanski as a substitute.
Brixendin was killed by James Field, who testified that he fired a bullet onto his friend’s head because he was robbed in Hollywood. Field also admitted to killing Yagle and Ennis two weeks later. Field testified that they let the two hostages escape from the Wind’s apartment.
The defendant’s lawyers denied that they were related to the Aryan Brotherhood, and they criticized prosecutors for reaching a deal with lifelong offenders.
“These people have no trade in life except lies,” Clement’s attorney Jane Fisher-Byrialsen said in her closing argument. “Lie is the only currency they know. ”
The jury heard sufficient testimony about Johnson and Clement, but witnesses provided primarily a second-hand account of Statham’s role in the gang.
“I sat in the same trial you did and didn’t hear John Stinson’s name,” his attorney Kenneth Reed told the jury in his closing speech. “Don’t know John.” Why is Stingson here?”
A witness testified that Statham sat on a three-person “committee” of the Aryan Brotherhood that resolved internal disputes and approved murders. Witnesses knew this urgently to him and he replied, “This is not something someone said to me. It’s just a hint.”
Prosecutors argued that Statham’s position in the gang was so certain that he could isolate himself from the crimes he had moved. “You didn’t get your hands dirty when you were in this gang for so long,” Stockman said.
As the prosecutor said, Statham’s crime was discussed in the murders of two Aryan fraternities members who were clearly not hurt. He was also charged with obtaining fraudulent unemployment benefits while incarcerated.
An investigator with the California Department of Employment Development testified that the state paid Stinson $19,000, and his unemployment statement said he lost his job as a “guardian assistant” during the 19th pandemic.
After the verdict, Reed once again raised questions about the credibility of the collaborators who testified against the client.
“It’s easy to say,’ John Stinson told me to do it, and John Stinson told me to do it.”
Stinson, Johnson and Clement are scheduled to be sentenced on May 19.
