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Man Who Left Boyfriend's Severed Head Near Hollywood Sign Gets 25 To Life
A man who was convicted of murdering and dismembering his boyfriend in 2011 was sentenced today to 25 years to life in prison.
Gabriel Campos-Martinez, 40, was convicted last month of murdering his boyfriend, Hervey Coronado Medellin. Today, Campos-Martinez was sentenced to 25 years to life, according to City News Service. L.A. Superior Court Judge Katherine Mader said she hoped Campos-Martinez would reveal to Medellin's family why he committed such a gruesome act, but he did not.
Christina Medellin Serrano, Medellin's niece, said in court that Medellin would have turned 70 years old today.
"We miss his voice, we miss his laughter, and most of all, we miss his presence," she said. She said she had no sympathy for her uncle's killer, and that she hasn't been able to bring herself to tell her father, who suffers from Alzheimer's disease, what happened to his brother.
Medellin, a 66-year-old retired flight attendant, was strangled by Campos-Martinez on or near December 27, 2011. The two had met while hiking in Griffith Park, and had lived together at Medellin's apartment in Hollywood for about six months.
Campos-Martinez dismembered Medellin's body and spread his remains throughout Griffith Park. On January 17, 2012, Medellin's head was found by a dog walker. Investigators soon discovered a hand and two feet nearby. While Medellin's torso was never recovered, the county deputy medical examiner said that recent testing may show that tissue specimens that were found buried near the Bronson Canyon caves belong to Medellin, KTLA reports.
Campos-Martinez was living in Texas when he was arrested for Medellin's murder in 2014. Police had previously investigated other leads, including that Medellin's death may have been related to a 1990s drug cartel, or that he had been a victim of Canadian murderer Luka Magnotta.
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Deputy District Attorney Bobby Grace said that Campos-Martinez had looked up instructions on how to dismember a human body for consumption online on the day they believe Medellin was killed. He told jurors that Campos-Martinez "committed a gruesome, callous murder upon somebody who showed him love, gave him shelter, gave him money ... This wasn't a sudden thing that happened. This was a planned murder.''
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