The following is a press release issued by the Mendocino County District Attorney:
A former Ukiah man with a long criminal record was sentenced this week in Mendocino County Superior Court to a life term in state prison on multiple felony crimes.
Raymond Devon Jones, 46, was convicted by a county jury last year of multiple felony crimes of domestic violence, including assault with a deadly weapon, battery with serious bodily injury, inflicting corporal injury on a cohabitant, dissuading a witness by means of threats or force, and vandalism causing greater than $400 in damage.
Following the jury verdict, a court trial was conducted where the trial judge found true sentencing enhancements alleged by the District Attorney’s Office. Assistant DA Dale Trigg alleged that defendant Jones has previously and separately suffered felony convictions for robbery and residential burglary in the San Joaquin County Superior Court, within the meaning of California’s Three Strikes law.
At a sentencing hearing on Thursday in Department A, Jones’ attorney argued that the sentencing judge should remove or “strike” one or both prior convictions for the purposes of sentencing because, it may be argued, a particular defendant falls outside the letter and spirit of the Three Strikes law.
Assistant DA Trigg, the prosecutor who presented the evidence to the jury last year, vigorously opposed the motion and argued that the defendant is a career criminal with a history of violence spanning more than 25 years.
Both Trigg and a probation report noted that the defendant, prior to the new convictions, had suffered six felony convictions, 22 misdemeanor convictions, and had served multiple prior state prison commitments.
Moreover, the defendant has a long history of parole and probation violations, which included committing new crimes of violence shortly after being released from prison.
During the commission of the crimes for which he now stands convicted, the defendant was on post-release community supervision, a new form of parole, following his most recent release from state prison seven months earlier.
As such, Trigg argued, the defendant was incorrigible, was not deserving of any leniency, and had earned his way to a life sentence.
Trial Judge Keith Faulder agreed, and on Thursday he denied the defense motion to strike Jones’ past convictions for sentencing purposes…
The sentencing recommendation of the Adult Probation Department was followed and defendant Jones received 114 years, 4 months to life in state prison.
The law enforcement agencies that developed the underlying evidence used to convict the defendant were the Ukiah Police Department and the District Attorney’s own Bureau of Investigations.
