Attorney Alleges Entrapment in Case of MV Attorney Accused of Killing 1 Ex-Wife and Hiring Killers to Get Another

By PAUL ANDERSON

A defense attorney is seeking an evidentiary hearing next month on allegations that investigators committed misconduct in the case of a man accused of killing his ex-wife aboard a cruise ship near Italy.

David Michael claims the investigators’ actions in the case against Lonnie Loren Kocontes are similar to what led another judge to boot the Orange County District Attorney’s Office from the case against the county’s worst mass killer.

However, prosecutors told Orange County Superior Court Judge James Stotler today their case is nothing like the one against Scott Dekraai, who is facing the death penalty for the Seal Beach beauty salon massacre.

Michael is arguing prosecutors stepped over the line when they brought a new case against Kocontes this week alleging he solicited two inmates to kill another ex-wife, who is a principal witness against him in the May 25, 2006, killing of 52-year-old Micki Kanesaki.

“They’re probably more serious -- that’s what’s in our pleadings,” Michael told the judge of his claims of misconduct.

Michael added, “I hope the prosecution isn’t trying to influence” appellate justices by releasing a news release about the new allegations against Kocontes.

The state Supreme Court has mandated appellate court reviews of the defense’s attempts to have charges dismissed against Kocontes after the Fourth District Court of Appeals previously denied other claims without comment. Prosecutors have a May 22 deadline to respond, Michael said.

As with the Dekraai case, Michael is arguing investigators violated the constitutional rights of his 57-year-old client by having jailhouse informants solicit damning information while the defendant was already represented by attorneys.

Stotler told the attorneys he was concerned about a lengthy hearing like the one in the Dekraai case, which took months before the District Attorney’s Office was thrown off the case. Prosecutors are appealing that ruling.

“That case in front of Judge (Thomas) Goethals went on forever,” Stotler said. “Maybe there’s a middle road we can reach.”

Seton Hunt, one of two prosecutors assigned to Kocontes’ case, assured the judge that the Kocontes case is nothing like the one involving Dekraai.

“I don’t believe the legal issues are any bit similar,” Hunt said.

The other prosecutor -- Susan Price -- told the judge that the solicitation to murder case was separate from the Kanesaki murder case and that any evidence gathered in the new case will not be used in the murder trial.

Price said “90 percent” of the claims Michael makes in a recent motion are “inapplicable” to the new case.

Investigators did not use jailhouse snitches, Hunt and Price said. The inmates were “percipient witnesses” to the solicitation of murder because Kocontes is accused of approaching them to get them to have her sign a document changing her story and then having her killed, the prosecutors allege.

One of the inmates came forward to authorities on his own, Price said.

Michael has also alleged the government had an investigator working undercover attempt a sting on Kocontes that fizzled. Part of his allegations involve entrapment, he said.

Authorities wired Kocontes’ cell for 15 days, but they did not get anything against him, Michael claims.

OTHER PATCH HEADLINES

• Famous OC Surf Family Arrested in Murder for Hire Plot
• Newport Company’s Toxic Pollution Poses ‘Unacceptable’ Health Risk to Community
• Embattled Judge Responds to Uproar over Reduced Sentence for Toddler Rapist
• Police Seek Witnesses in Fatal 5 Freeway Hit and Run
• Alaskan Storm to Bring Wintry Conditions
• Attorney Accused of Soliciting Second Wife’s Murder to Keep her From Testifying about First Wife’s Murder
• OC Man Accused of Fraudulently Selling Middle East In-N-Out Franchise to Investors

City News Service