This shit aint gangsta at all and your "big homie" a straight punk for taking the life away from two young children's father.
FACTS
 The crimes
In September 2001, the murder victim, Justin Roberts, lived in an apartment in Carmichael along with his girlfriend Sally Lewis and their two small children, Lewis's brother Levi, and Roberts's friend Eric Aguiar.2  Roberts and his family shared the master bedroom, Levi occupied the other bedroom, and Aguiar slept on the couch in the living room.
Roberts legally grew marijuana on his patio for medicinal purposes, and Lewis was his licensed caregiver.   Roberts also sold marijuana to friends, however.   Aguiar had a felony conviction for transporting marijuana.
Two or three weeks before the homicide, Gilbert Espinoza, Jr., went to Roberts's home to buy marijuana.   According to Aguiar, Espinoza said his friend “Munchie” (codefendant Craver) wanted to make a purchase.   Espinoza assured Aguiar that Craver was “cool.” 3  Aguiar agreed to sell Craver a quarter-pound of marijuana for $1,100 as a favor to Espinoza.
 Aguiar later met Craver and exchanged the marijuana for cash, but Roberts discovered on inspection that the cash was counterfeit;  Aguiar paid him to cover the loss.   Aguiar conveyed his anger and his desire to recover the money to Espinoza, but Aguiar and Espinoza denied looking for Craver or putting out word on the street about him.
Around 4:00 a.m. on September 14, Aguiar, sleeping on the living room couch in the dark apartment, was suddenly awakened by the sound of the window blinds crashing, followed by someone jumping through the open window and landing on top of him.   He could see only that the intruder was Black.   The intruder hit him in the head with something metallic.   Aguiar shoved his right index finger into the intruder's eye socket, causing him to scream twice, “I need help.”
Lewis and Roberts, also now awake, ran to the living room, with Roberts ahead.   Roberts flipped the light switch, temporarily blinding Lewis.
Three gunshots rang out.   Aguiar saw the flashes and heard the shots near his head.   He did not know whether his antagonist or a second intruder had fired the shots.   Aguiar's antagonist then jumped out the window.
Lewis found Aguiar bleeding in the living room.   Then she found Roberts lying in a pool of blood on the bathroom floor, dying of a gunshot wound to the chest.
Steven Palenko, who lived in an apartment in the next building, was woken by the gunshots.   He tried to call 911, but misdialed in the dark.   Hearing a woman scream that her husband had been shot, and looking out the window, Palenko saw three dark-skinned men running away.   He observed the clothing worn by the one later identified as defendant.   He saw the men jump over a fence, reach the gate of the next apartment complex, crouch behind the fence until a car drove past, then open the gate;  two ran to the left and the other to the right.   Palenko then succeeded in calling 911.
Sacramento County Deputy Sheriff John Sydow, dispatched to the scene, heard on the radio that suspects had been seen fleeing.   He saw a Black male, later identified as defendant, running through a gas station.   When Sydow stopped defendant, defendant gave a false last name.   Sydow detained him, then brought him to a field identification showup, where Palenko identified him as one of the three men he had seen.   Palenko also identified codefendant Craver in a later photo lineup as another of the men.
 At the crime scene, officers found a .45-caliber shell casing on the floor, another shell casing on the couch, a shell casing on the side of the couch, and a bullet hole in the kitchen cabinet.   Detective Grant Stomsvik determined that the gun had probably been fired close to the couch along the west wall.   The officers also discovered evidence of a marijuana sales operation in the apartment.
DNA evidence showed that blood on the window blind and couch was Aguiar's and that material in fingernail scrapings taken from Aguiar's right index finger had come from Craver.   Fingerprints on the living room window blinds were determined not to be defendant's.
