2 To Be Sentenced in Murder For Hire Stabbing

Two men convicted in a deadly stabbing attack on a woman in a Century City parking garage are expected to be sentenced today to life in prison without the possibility of parole.

Gabriel Jay Marquez, 50, and Jose Luis Moya, 54, were convicted Feb. 20 of first-degree murder and conspiracy to commit murder in a crime masterminded by Pamela Fayed’s estranged husband. A third man, 26-year-old Steven Vicente Simmons, was convicted along with Marquez and Moya, and sentenced in April to life in prison without parole.

Jurors also found true the special circumstance allegation of murder while lying in wait against the three defendants, along with the special circumstance allegation of murder for financial gain against Moya, who had worked as a ranch hand for the woman’s estranged husband, James Fayed, at his Ventura County ranch.

James Fayed -- who was tried separately -- was convicted in May 2011 of murder and conspiracy for masterminding the attack on the 44-year-old victim, who was stabbed 13 times as she approached her SUV in a parking garage at Watt Tower.

He was sentenced to death in November 2011 by Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Kathleen Kennedy, who noted that Fayed was nearby as his wife was being “brutally and brazenly” murdered, and that others reacted to the victim’s “blood-curdling screams.”

The Fayeds were in the midst of a bitter divorce, and the killing occurred just after the two met with their criminal attorneys as a result of a federal investigation into the couple’s gold-trading business.

City News Service