Posted: 10:02 pm PDT October 26, 2011
*OAKLAND, Calif. -- *Tewodros Gebreselassie was sentenced Wednesday to three
consecutive terms of life in prison without the possibility of parole for
his role in the fatal shooting of three in-laws at their Oakland apartment
complex on Thanksgiving Day 2006.
Prosecutor Joni Leventis said the victims in the case were shot by Tewodros Gebreselassie's older brother, 48-year-old Asmerom Gebreselassie but Tewodros played a key role in the bloodbath by "ingratiating himself" with the victims and letting his brother into their apartment.
However, Tewodros' lawyer, James Giller, said there's no evidence that Tewodros was part of a plan to kill the victims.
Tewodros, 44, told Alameda County Superior Court Judge Vernon Nakahara he had "no plan" to help kill the victims and "never discussed" a plan with his brother.
Leventis said during a four-month-long trial that ended with jury verdicts on May 31 that the Gebreselassie brothers conspired to kill their in-laws at their apartment at the Keller Plaza complex at 5301 Telegraph Ave. in Oakland on Nov. 23, 2006, in a mistaken act of revenge.
Leventis said the brothers erroneously believed that their in-laws were responsible for the sudden death of their brother, 42-year-old Abraham Tewolde, earlier that year.
Tewolde was married to Winta Mehari and died at the couple's home at 2238 Russell St. in Berkeley on March 1, 2006. Leventis said two doctors who examined Tewolde's body determined that he died of natural causes, and Berkeley police said no foul play was involved.
However, Leventis said the Gebreselassie brothers were still convinced that Tewolde had been killed by Mehari, perhaps with the help of her family members, and decided that Mehari and her family members should die.
Mehari, 28, was killed in the Thanksgiving Day shooting rampage, as was her brother, 17-year-old Yonas Mehari, and their mother, Regbe Bahrengasi, 50.
Leventis said Asmerom Gebreselassie shot all the victims and Tewodros Gebreselassie assisted his brother by letting him into the Mehari family's apartment.
The Gebreselassie and Mehari families are from Eritrea.
Asmerom Gebreselassie admitted during the trial that he fatally shot the victims in the case but said he acted in self-defense, a claim that was rejected by jurors.
The Gebreselassie brothers were both convicted of three counts of first-degree murder and two special-circumstance murder clauses: committing multiple murders and committing murder during the course of a kidnapping.
They also were both convicted of one count of attempted murder for wounding another in-law, Yehferom Mehari, in the shooting, one count of kidnapping for taking Winta Mehari's 2-year-old son, Isaac, from the scene, and two counts of false imprisonment.
Asmerom Gebreselassie was sentenced on Aug. 22 to three consecutive terms of life in prison without parole, one term of life in prison with the possibility of parole plus 132 years to life.
In addition to his three life terms without parole, Tewodros Gebreselassie was sentenced to one term of life in prison with the possibility of parole plus 15 years.
Giller asked Nakahara to set aside the jury's first-degree murder convictions against Tewodros Gebreselassie, reduce them to second-degree murder and sentence him to something less than life in prison without the possibility of parole, although he acknowledged, "It's not easy what I'm asking you to do."
Giller said Tewodros is "quite a brilliant man" who earned three degrees from the University of California at Berkeley, was never previously convicted of a crime and "spent his life helping other people" by tutoring students, helping build homes in Sudan and starting a university in Eritrea.
But Leventis said, "He assisted his brother in committing a cold-blooded killing" and "he didn't help the Mehari family on Thanksgiving Day."
Instead, Leventis said, "He helped his brother gun down three people."
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