Murder convictions overturned for 3 gang members
By: Bill Myers
Examiner Staff Writer
March 30, 2009
Three gang members who were found guilty in the beating death of a theology student had their first-degree murder convictions overturned because the judge gave improper instructions to the jury.
Warren Helm died in the street outside the Diversite night club in Northwest, an innocent victim of a vicious gang fight that had started inside the club. After Helm jumped out of his friend’s car to help a homeless man being beaten and kicked by the gang members, the gang members turned on him. He was chased down, stabbed and slashed repeatedly, and beaten.
Five men, all members of the Mara R street gang, were convicted of first-degree murder in Helm’s death in 1999. But a three-judge panel of the D.C. Court of Appeals recently ruled that three of the defendants had their trials compromised by faulty jury instructions and tossed out the first-degree murder convictions.
It’s now up to the U.S. attorney’s office whether to retry the men — Carlos A. Robles-Benevides, Santos Felipe Bonilla and Oscar Villatoro — on the first-degree charges. All three were convicted of second-degree murder in Helm’s death.
All three were convicted of “aiding and abetting” Helms’ death in that they helped chase Helms down and participated in his beating. But at trial, the jury was instructed that someone is legally responsible “for the acts of other persons that are the natural and probable consequence of the crime in which he intentionally participated.”
The appellate court, however, ruled that the “natural and probable consequence” phrase violated a defendant’s rights. That made last Thursday’s reversal in the Helms murder all but inevitable.
Attorneys for the three defendants said they were gratified by the decision, but added they might ask the full court to reconsider tossing out all of the men’s convictions from the attacks.
“I think the court jumped through a lot of hoops to find that some of the errors weren’t prejudicial,” said Jenifer Wicks, Villatoro’s lawyer.
