Alvarez Guilty on 11 Counts in Deadly Metrolink Trial

KTLA News

11:42 PM EDT, June 26, 2008

LOS ANGELES -- Jurors convicted Juan Manuel Alvarez of 11 counts of first degree murder for the deadly Metrolink crash three years ago that killed 11 people and injured 180.

Alvarez, 29, left his Jeep on the tracks at the Los Angeles-Glendale border Jan. 26, 2005 causing a Metrolink train to derail and explode into a fireball.

The nine-woman, three-man jury reached its verdict at the beginning of its second full day of deliberations.

They also found the Compton laborer guilty of arson and a special circumstance allegation that makes him elligible for the death penalty.

Jurors will begin hearing testimony in the penalty phase of the case on July 7 to determine whether Alvarez should be put to death for his crimes.

Alvarez sat without showing emotion as teh guilty verdicts were announced in the downtown Los Angeles courtroom. Family members expressed relief outside the courthouse after the verdicts were read saying they believed justice had been done.

Prosecutors had argued that Alvarez was trying to intentionally cause a catastrophe to get attention.

But Alvarez insisted he was intent on committing suicide but changed his mind and then could not get the Jeep off the tracks.

In her final argument Tuesday, Deputy District Attorney Cathryn Brougham told the jury that Alvarez sacrificed 11 lives on Jan. 26, 2005, because he was "angry at the world" and wanted to "do the biggest thing he could" to get attention.

Alvarez's actions early that day showed that he was "acting with purpose and intent," she said, telling the jury that the defendant acknowledged thinking about killing his estranged wife, Carmen.

During his five days of testimony, Alvarez apologized for causing the tragedy, and asked forgiveness from relatives of the victims. He told jurors that while he expected to be punished, he was "not a murderer."

"It was an accident," he said, "a stupid mistake."

Defense lawyers had portrayed their client as a troubled but sympathetic man who had survived an abusive childhood. As a boy, an uncle raped him. He had tried to kill himself, for which his parents and grandmother punished him with a beater. Later in life he turned to drugs, got hooked on methamphetamine, which made him delusional. He imagined his was was having affairs, even with her own nephew.

Metrolink train No. 100 -- which was heading south to Union Station -- derailed after plowing into the defendant's Cherokee, then crashed into northbound Metrolink train No. 901 at the Glendale-Los Angeles city line. The train also struck a Union Pacific freight train locomotive, which wound up on its side.

Along with the 11 people who were killed, more than 180 others were injured.