Oakland man guilty of murder - no body of victim

[alp227]

An Oakland man was convicted Tuesday of second-degree murder for killing his ex-girlfriend in 2004 even though her body hasn't been found.

It is a case with similarities to that of Hans Reiser, who led police to his wife's body after he was convicted of murdering her in 2008.

Eric Mora, 55, showed no emotion when the verdict was read in Alameda County Superior Court in Oakland. He faces 15 years to life in prison when he is sentenced May 25 by Judge Vern Nakahara for killing Cynthia Alonzo.

(...)

Alonzo was 48 when she failed to show up at a Thanksgiving dinner with her family in San Francisco in 2004. Her blood was found in his home on the 6200 block of Brookside Avenue in the Oakland hills, authorities said. Mora also had a deep cut to his hand, prosecutors said.

Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2012/02/28/BASS1NDFOK.DTL

Was the standard for conviction flimsy, given that investigators never found Alonzo's body for further evidence beyond the bloodstains and the suspect's hand wound?

[MrSlayer]

1. Circumstantial evidence is often used.

The prosecutor must have made a hell of a case.

[fe6252fes]

6. +1000

[Live and Learn]

2. I'd have to have a heck of a lot more to convict

Hoping they did have it but if they did that was a pitiful news story.

[Viva_Daddy]

3. What happened to habeas corpus?

[xrayvision2005]

4. Innocent until proven . . .

Guilty by default is more apt to be the determining factor with many convictions. Whatever the media decides dictates the outcome. Evidence? Sensibility? Rationale? Inconsequential.

I was the victim of a crime and tried as the perpetrator. The greater the shock value, the more dollars stream into every pocket imaginable. That's certainly nothing new but it sure does hit home at a different level when you are the one who has been falsely accused. ANYONE reading could be the next detainee. Stay safe.

[padem196645]

5. +1

[Spryguy]

7. Easy answer

I'm guessing the only evidence they had is that he was a black man. Typical rascist pig jurors/police.

[jberryhill]

8. He's got one of the worst cases of vitiligo since Michael Jackson

[Spryguy]

10. I retract...

my earlier statement. Yeah, I would have voted guilty to.

[jberryhill]

9. "Was the standard for conviction flimsy?"

I'm willing to bet that the trial consisted of more evidence than the two sentences in that flimsy article.

[TheKentuckian]

11. Probably, it should be near impossible to get a conviction in such a situation

I'm not much on circumstantial evidence though.