The Gun Mission
The Gun Mission
The Portos Robbery, Part 2: The man who shot Mark Achilli tells a story that doesn't quite add up
The man who was convicted of killing a Los Gatos businessman in an alleged murder-for-hire plot began his interrogation worried about getting beaten by police.
On March 29, 2008, Burbank resident Lucio Estrada was interviewed by by Los Gatos police detectives investigating the death of Mark Achilli, a local businessman and bar owner, who was shot to death outside his Los Gatos condo two weeks earlier.
Achilli died after he took four rounds to the body and two to the head. Estrada explained he wanted to help police.
There were some problems on both sides.
One, Estrada didn’t want his brother to be implicated. Two, he didn’t seem to be telling detectives the truth when it came to his role as Achilli’s shooter. The result was a dramatic marathon of an interview that didn’t really align with the detectives’ theory of the case.
It began with Estrada complaining he’d been beaten by Burbank Police. Something later identified as a pattern of misbehavior there, probably resulting from the shooting death of a police officer in 2003 and the take-over robbery of Porto’s in late 2007.
LOS GATOS SGT. MATT FRISBY:
You'd better relax bro. I need you to relax.
LUCIO ESTRADA:
....I've never killed anybody in my life.
FRISBY:
Listen. Listen. We're gonna get to some of these things and I'm gonna talk to you about this and explain to you why we're down here.
ESTRADA:
.... They arrested my little brother.
FRISBY:
Listen to me. Before we do, um I'm gonna have to take care of some housekeeping stuff. You've been arrested before you understand that you, that you have rights. Correct? You understand that?
ESTRADA:
...I was beat up. I was kicked.
FRISBY:
Here's the deal. Here's, here's what you need to listen to. Listen to me real quick. We're not here to beat you up. We're not here to kick you. We're gonna treat you with respect as long as you treat us with respect.
Call it a game of poker where the detectives were holding many of the aces. First of all, they had witnesses at the scene who would positively identify Estrada as the shooter. And, they had statements from Robert Jacome (who drove Estrada from Burbank to Los Gatos) and Daniel Chaidez, one of two middlemen who allegedly set up the shooting.
Cops believed the case was a murder-for-hire ultimately arranged by Paul Garcia, a San Jose mortgage banker and freshman football coach at Bellarmine College Prep. Garcia has repeatedly denied his involvement. Garcia and his family members say he was wrongfully convicted and believe the slaying resulted from a dispute over drug money involving Achilli and dealers from Southern California.
Police say Achilli had recently sold his stake in Los Gatos’ Mountain Charlie’s bar and the adjoining 180 Restaurant to Garcia. Detectives said both men dated Tessa Donnelly, a bartender and manager at Mountain Charlie’s. Prosecutors theorized that Donnelly dumped Garcia to be with Achilli and that jealousy drove Garcia to arrange the homicide.
Detectives worked that angle hard in their interrogation of Estrada. The only problem was getting pieces to align, as Jacome, the driver, thought Estrada was out to collect drug money from a deadbeat. He called it a “gun mission.”
The interrogation of Estrada, conducted by Los Gatos Sgts. Frisby and Mike D’Antonio, was bolstered by what they believed. And, the more Estrada danced around the facts, the more he ultimately trapped himself.
Finally, he admitted he was hired to do the job, but said the shooter was a guy he knew as “D-Money.”
Detectives also had items they recovered in a search of Estrada’s home.
Investigators searched Estrada's residence and discovered drugs, including marijuana, cocaine, and methamphetamine, as well as several firearms. In the defendant's bedroom, officers discovered a black baseball cap with "LA" on it, two pairs of black "Dickie's" type pants, and a book titled "A Sniper's Journey. "In his bedroom closet officers discovered a black shoulder bag, which contained $2,000.00 in cash, two black T-shirts, and three books titled "The Final Mission", "How to Make a Silencer for a .45," and "Hit Man - A Technical Manual for Independent Contractors."
There were also notebooks.
Officer Whitfield found two notebooks, one purple and one gray; a black bag containing $2,000 cash; and a black baseball cap with "LA" on it, which he found hanging on a hook on the back of a door. The notebooks were marked as exhibit Nos. 92 (the purple notebook) and 93 (the gray notebook), and two pages of notes taken from exhibit No. 93 were marked as exhibit No. 91. On one of the pages inside the purple notebook the name "Chaidez" was written. In the pages of the gray notebook was a letter addressed to Estrada. One of the pages of notes taken from the gray notebook included phrases such as "surveillance," "Fast Fast Fast," "Really Fast," "military style precision," "gloves, disguise," "fake wigs," "stay calm," "calm and precise," and "shoot to kill!"
Estrada v. McDowell, Case No. 16-cv-02827-YGR (PR), 4 (N.D. Cal. Nov. 3, 2017)
When Estrada was asked how it was that witnesses could identify him at the scene, he admitted being there, but said it was only to scout the situation for “D-Money.”
Frisby repeatedly brought up witness statements and told Estrada he had statements from Miguel and Daniel Chaidez, the alleged middlemen who arranged the contract hit.
FRISBY
So you can, you can say Miguel is lying. You can say Daniel is lying. You can say the eyewitnesses are lying but you can't say the DNA was lying, Miguel or ah ah Lucio. You can't say that's lying. So again, this is your opportunity to say what happened because the person who started this in my mind is the person who is the most culpable. You're, you're a victim in a set of circumstances that listen, listen, listen, you're a victim in a set of circumstances that spun out of control and maybe even, for all I know, you were just suppose to scare this guy. Maybe it turned into something completely different but you need to tell me that. I can't, I don't have a crystal ball. I can't, I can't tell you that what happened. You can tell. Were you just suppose to scare the guy and it turned bad? Um, was it, was it....
ESTRADA
I feel like I'm being set up. I feel like everyone's pointing a finger at me..
DNA in clothing found near the scene would also play a role in identifying Estrada as the shooter. Ultimately Estrada was convicted for his role in the Achilli murder.
On November 30, 2010, Santa Clara County Superior Court Judge David A. Cena sentenced Estrada to life in prison without the possibility of parole consecutive to a term of twenty-five years to life in prison.
Like Garcia, Estrada has appealed his sentence. Those appeals have been so far denied.
Why am I writing about this case?
