Death Penalty Being Considered For Trio Of Killers

Opening statements are slated to begin today in the penalty trial of two Marines who murdered a young sergeant and his wife of two months during a home invasion robbery at the couple's French Valley residence.

Last week, an eight-man, four-woman jury convicted Emrys Justin Justin John, 23, and Tyrone Miller, 25, of first-degree murder and found true special circumstance allegations that multiple lives were taken in the same crime and that the killings occurred in the course of a robbery and in the course of a burglary. Jurors also convicted Miller of sexual assault.

A separate jury convicted Kevin Darnell Cox, 25, of everything but the sexual assault charge. Cox's penalty trial was also scheduled to get underway today.

Jurors must now decide whether to recommend life in prison without parole or the death penalty for the trio. A fourth defendant, 25-year-old Kesaun Kedron Sykes, is slated to be tried in August.

The defendants robbed and killed 24-year-old Janek Pietrzak and his 26-year-old wife, Quiana Faye Jenkins-Pietrzak, in the predawn hours of Oct. 15, 2008.

Deputy District Attorney Daniel DeLimon called the defendants "Marines by day and criminals by night." According to DeLimon, the four Marines wanted to get inside the Pietrzaks' two-story house at 31319 Bermuda Ave. to steal their belongings -- but also to indulge in a power trip.

"This was about ... taking pleasure in the sexual humiliation of a woman and tormenting her husband by making him watch," the prosecutor said.

DeLimon said all of the men pummeled Pietrzak, while Cox was delegated with the responsibility of binding the couple to immobilize and silence them. Cox also planted false evidence in an attempt to throw off authorities, directing his associates where to paint epithets such as the "n" word to make it appear as though the crime was racially motivated, according to DeLimon.

Quiana was black, and her Poland-born husband, white.

Miller testified that he was displeased with Pietrzak because the sergeant had told the lance corporal only a day or two earlier that his chances of being promoted to corporal were nil.

Cox rang the doorbell twice shortly after 1 a.m., and Pietrzak came downstairs, deactivated his house alarm and opened the front door. The defendants, armed with shotguns, beat the young sergeant into submission, DeLimon alleged.

According to the prosecutor, Miller and Sykes stripped Quiana and used a vibrator they found in the couple's bathroom to violate her sexually. John shot the victims execution-style with a 9mm handgun.

All of the men served in a helicopter maintenance squadron at Camp Pendleton. --City News Service