Aguilar gets 50 years

Superior Court judge Ramona Manglona yesterday meted out a 50-year prison term on Larry Banal Aguilar, the man convicted of murdering his former girlfriend in July last year.

Manglona imposed the prison term without parole, which means that Aguilar, who is 39 years old, would be leaving prison when he is already 89 years old.

Describing it as a strong message against domestic violence, CNMI chief prosecutor David Hutton said Aguilar’s sentence is the longest prison term ever imposed by a CNMI court in a domestic violence case.

Hutton lauded the Family Violence Task Force headed by deputy attorney general Clyde Lemons Jr., the police department’s Criminal Investigation Bureau, and his staff at the Attorney General’s Office’s Criminal Division for pooling efforts in the prosecution of Aguilar.

Aguilar brutally attacked Filipina worker Leonor Salunga Miranda on July 14, 2003 with an air pistol and a machete. He shot the woman in the head and hacked the victim several times, which nearly amputated one of her hands.

The attack on Miranda occurred at her San Jose residence. The victim’s six-year-old daughter witnessed the gruesome crime.

Aguilar and Miranda had just separated when the crime occurred. He had accompanied the woman to her new residence on the day it happened.

The victim’s sister, Maria Fe, had testified that she was on an overseas phone call when she heard Miranda on an extension line crying for help. When Maria Fe responded, she saw the victim’s six-year-old daughter crying hysterically for help. Maria Fe claimed she saw Aguilar punch her bloodied sister on the arms, while the daughter claimed she saw Aguilar hit her mother with a gun.

Aguilar fled the crime scene and sped off using a pickup truck when Maria Fe responded to the victim’s call for help. He went into hiding, but police operatives swooped down on him at a Talofofo farm on the morning of July 16 last year.

Aguilar initially contested nine criminal charges lodged against him by the AGO. The charges included first- and second-degree murder, aggravated assault and battery, assault and battery, assault, and two counts each of assault with a dangerous weapon and disturbing the peace.

Later, he entered into a plea agreement with the AGO and admitted the premeditated killing of Miranda. He pleaded guilty to first-degree murder, an offense that entails a mandatory minimum penalty of 10 years imprisonment and a maximum of life imprisonment and a $10,000-fine.

In the plea agreement, Aguilar stipulated that his sentence would be within a minimum of 20 years to a maximum of 50 years in prison.

The judge approved the plea agreement on Jan. 7, 2004, convicting Aguilar of first-degree murder and dismissing the remaining charges.

During the hearing on the plea agreement, Aguilar’s lawyer, public defender Masood Karimipour, said his client wanted to plead guilty even if he had offered him a line of defense, which would assert that the defendant was emotionally distressed when the killing happened. Karimipour said Aguilar was remorseful over his former girlfriend’s death.

“He [Aguilar] is a man of conscience. He feels. He’s not a monster,” the public defender said during the hearing. “He wanted to spare a six-year-old child from being called in as witness…[and a] family from any further anguish.”

During yesterday’s sentencing, Hutton said he pushed for the 50-year prison term against Aguilar by presenting the testimonies of witnesses such as police detective Alfred Celes, the victim’s sister Maria Fe, and clinical psychologist Janet McCullough. Hutton also presented a tape-recorded message of the victim’s daughter.

Yesterday’s proceedings lasted about two hours.