3 Mothers Dead; 3 OC Men Sentenced For Killing Their Partners Friday

SANTA ANA, CA — Yahaira Boykins, 23, was shot repeatedly by her estranged husband in her Laguna Hills bedroom.

Maria Teresa Murillo Rojas, 26, was killed by her husband in the Santa Ana apartment they shared with her infant while he was out on bail for raping her.

Dora Maria Rosas Moreno, 48, was killed by her tire iron-wielding ex-boyfriend in Irvine.

There is little nexus between the three cases beyond the deadly scourge of domestic violence. But on Friday in Santa Ana, something else connected the three women slain by the men they once trusted. All three of their killers appeared in Orange County Superior Court to be sentenced.

According to reporting by City News Service, 32-year-old former U.S. Marine Jerel Mark Boykins pleaded guilty to murder with a sentencing enhancement for the personal use of a gun. He had driven from Camp Pendelton to his estranged wife's home and killed the young mother of three. He was sentenced Friday to 35 years to life in prison.

Twenty-nine-year-old Fernando Jaramillo Llamas on Friday pleaded guilty to second-degree murder, leading police on a chase, rape of a spouse, criminal threats, dissuading a witness by force, bringing a controlled substance into jail and robbery. In May of 2018, he had been arrested for raping his wife and was ordered to stay away from her. A year later, he killed her in the apartment they shared with their baby. He was sentenced to 32 years to life in prison

Omar Velazquezhuar, a 48-year-old Lake Forest man, was convicted by a jury of first-degree murder by lying in wait for ambushing his ex-girlfriend outside her workplace and beating her with a tire iron. She was the mother of his two children, and she died from her injuries a month later. He was sentenced to 25 years to life in prison.

The Orange County Domestic Violence Death Review Team in 2022 analyzed a decade of domestic violence murders in the county. The team found 113 domestic violence homicides between 2006 to 2017, a number the team considered to be a significant undercounting because some domestic violence homicides are classified as accidental or never prompt criminal charges.

"Often, there are warning signs before domestic violence turns fatal. The most common sign is prior physical abuse, but non-physical abuse—including threats and jealousy—are also indicators," the team wrote in its report. "While these signs are identifiable in many cases, often these behaviors go unreported. This is exemplified in Orange County where just under half (46 percent) of intimate partner fatality cases involved some known history of violence, yet only 9 percent of these cases had a restraining order in place."

In Orange County, most domestic abusers are men, and most who kill their partners use a gun, the team found.

"Orange County is no stranger to gun violence in the home, and firearms were used in 72% of fatalities in our review," the team wrote, adding that "10 of the 113 intimate partner violence fatalities that occurred in Orange County between 2006 and 2017 were caused by strangulation. This 9% figure is significant and deserves to be studied as a lethality risk and cause. Up to 68% of abuse survivors will be victims of near-fatal strangulation by their partner. Victims of strangulation face a 750% increase in later homicide-related death."

If you or someone you know is a victim of domestic violence, the National Domestic Violence Hotline is available 24/7 in multiple languages at 800-799-7233.

Local resources from housing, healthcare, counseling and legal help can be found by calling 2-1-1.

A list of Orange County domestic violence shelters can be found here.

City News Service contributed to this report.