The painful ordeal of the family, friends, and community of Yik Oi Huang, which began six years ago, continues as Keonte Gathron, the man convicted of her murder, seeks a potentially prolonged delay in sentencing, a new trial, and the appointment of an attorney to represent him.
On Monday, Gathron appeared before San Francisco Superior Court Judge Eric Fleming at a hearing that had been delayed by Gathron’s failure to appear at the court’s last two attempts to impose a sentence for his January 2019 crime spree. Gathron had already been convicted by a jury for the murder of the 88-year-old Chinese immigrant affectionately known as “Grandma Huang” and numerous kidnapping, robbery, carjacking, and related crimes. He faces two life sentences plus an additional 31 years in prison.
Gathron’s Monday maneuver represented the long-held fears of court observers that Gathron would attempt to set aside his convictions based on his incompetence after being granted the right to represent himself at trial. A criminal defendant may waive the right to an attorney, but only after a so-called Faretta process in which the court explains the criminal court process and the consequences of self-representing. Fleming reminded Gathron at the Monday hearing that he and another judge, prior to and repeatedly during his trial, had explained the court process and inquired whether Gathron understood what he was risking by seeking to represent himself. Yet, Judge Fleming stated, “Never once did you bring up any mental deficiency.”
Gathron and the public defender’s office have, for the moment, cast aside any objections to the sentencing report in favor of the larger effort to negate the proceedings and have a new trial.
The public defender’s office is now aiding Gathron after having only the assistance of an investigator at trial and at the first sentencing hearing in November. At that hearing, Judge Fleming announced, but postponed to Dec. 3, his intended sentence only because the adult probation department had failed to ensure Gathron’s receipt of the sentencing report he was entitled by law to review and comment on at the hearing. Gathron and the public defender’s office have, for the moment, cast aside any objections to the sentencing report in favor of the larger effort to negate the proceedings and have a new trial.
Fleming viewed Gathron’s motions with skepticism but did not make a ruling. He also expressed some exasperation after repeated interruptions. While declining to appoint Elizabeth Camacho, felony defense manager of the public defender’s office, to be Gathron’s attorney, Fleming asked them, “How can either one of you be effective if you talk when the court is talking?”
Assistant District Attorney Nathan Quigley opposed the motions he described as “a last-second request to delay the inevitable.” He noted that Judge Fleming had previously asked Gathron whether he would move for a new trial and that the delay in the sentencing hearing was for the sole purpose of hearing Gathron’s comments on the sentencing report. He also stated that during the trial, Gathron ably made motions, interrogated and cross-examined witnesses, and did not request an attorney.
At the Monday hearing, Gathron contended that he had been “suffering mentally” since he was a juvenile and should have been evaluated when he asked to represent himself. He reminded Judge Fleming that he cried during the trial when a doctor testified and was undergoing a mental crisis, even if he was not openly expressing it or asking for help. In his own words, “You did ask me, and I said I wanted to proceed, but I didn’t understand.”
Now Judge Fleming has a series of intertwined and complicated questions: Was Gathron competent to represent himself at trial? Is he sufficiently competent now to ask for a new lawyer? Can the public defender step in to represent him if he is not competent enough to withdraw his previous waiver of his right to have an attorney? Must the sentencing phase of this proceeding come to a halt?
Judge Fleming is likely to appoint a medical professional to evaluate Gathron’s competence and rely upon that assessment to answer these questions. Assistant District Attorney Quigley insists that Gathron cannot simply self-declare his lack of competence, nor can the public defender, who has not yet been appointed to represent him. At a minimum, Gathron’s gambit means further delays in the proceedings. If he is successful, Quigley predicted a “massive delay of months as a conservative estimate” since a newly appointed attorney will need to obtain and review the voluminous trial transcript.
Judge Fleming will decide quickly and has called Gathron, his intended attorney, and the assistant district attorney back to his courtroom on Tuesday morning. For Grandma Huang’s family members, who described her as “the emotional center of our family” and her death as “unimaginably cruel [leaving] our family devastated”, the ordeal continues.