Appeals Court Upholds Conviction of Man Who Murdered Girl at Weddington Park

A state appeals court panel today upheld a man’s conviction for fatally stabbing his girlfriend at a Studio City park.

The three-justice panel from California’s 2nd District Court of Appeal rejected the defense’s contention that there was insufficient evidence to support Stephen Todd Joanou Jr.’s first-degree murder conviction for the attack on Patrina Sabella in the early morning hours of March 20, 2012.

The 32-year-old Rosamond woman was stabbed 19 times near a baseball field at Weddington Park South.

“Sufficient evidence supports the elements of premeditation and deliberation,” the panel found in its seven-page ruling, which noted that the woman had been stabbed five times in her jugular vein.

A girl who lived nearby and her aunt both thought that screams emanating from the baseball field at the park were from the filming of a movie, and a homeless man who slept on the baseball field’s bleachers awoke to “’long yells’ and ‘prolonged’ screams of the name ‘Stephen,”’ according to the appellate court panel’s ruling.

Joanou was arrested later that afternoon.

He was convicted last year and sentenced to 26 years to life in state prison.

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City News Service