Spurned boss gets 39 to life for rape-murder plot
John Coté, Chronicle Staff Writer

Thursday, January 31, 2008



(01-30) 16:38 PST REDWOOD CITY -- The owner of a Menlo Park jewelry store convicted of hiring a man to kidnap, rape and kill one of his employees because she spurned his romantic advances was sentenced today in a Redwood City courtroom to 39 years to life in prison.

Ricardo Zambrano, 38, said little before Judge Thomas McGinn Smith handed down his sentence in San Mateo County Superior Court, other than that he plans to appeal.

"For all practical purposes, he will spend the rest of his life in prison," prosecutor Morris Maya said afterward. "He' s just a guy that's extremely dangerous. The evidence is pretty clear that this is someone who did his level best to torture, rape and murder a woman who did nothing to him except say, 'I'm not interested in dating you.' "

The woman escaped and testified against Zambrano and an accomplice at trial.

Zambrano, who immigrated to United States illegally from Mexico when he was 18, maintains his innocence and told authorities the case against him was a conspiracy, according to his probation report.

"I had no reason to kidnap this young lady," Zambrano said in the report.

He was accused of hiring Alfonso Cuevas Gonzalez to kidnap the woman off the street at gunpoint June 10, 2005, as she left work at Zambrano's jewelry store inside the Mi Rancho Market.

Gonzalez then drove the woman, identified in court as Jane Doe, to Fresno, where Zambrano had persuaded a woman to allow the use of her basement. There, the victim was to be raped and murdered, prosecutors said.

Another woman ultimately allowed Zambrano's employee to escape and call her family. Gonzalez was convicted in March and later sentenced to 35 years to life in prison.

A jury convicted Zambrano in April of five charges, including conspiracy to rape, kidnapping for carjacking and threatening a witness, but deadlocked 11 to 1 in favor of conviction on the charge of conspiracy to murder, which carries a sentence of 25 years to life, prosecutors said.

Zambrano was retried on that charge and convicted in November.

E-mail John Coté at jcote@sfchronicle.com.

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