Drive By Shooting

A fourth person has been arrested and charged in connection with the August drive-by shooting off Baker Street in Costa Mesa that left one man dead and four others wounded. David Ortega, 24, appeared in court Monday on a charge of being an accessory to murder. He did not enter a plea, and his arraignment was continued to Wednesday at Harbor Justice Center in Newport Beach. His bail was set at $100,000. Costa Mesa police arrested Ortega at his home in Tustin on Sept. 28. It was unclear why police failed to release any information about the arrest until Monday.

  An Illinois man was arrested early today in Buena Park in connection with a drive-by shooting on Baker Street in Costa Mesa that left one man dead and four others wounded.   Anthony Nicholas Dispensa, 21, was arrested in the parking lot of the Franklin Motel on Beach Boulevard in Buena Park where he was staying. A warrant for his arrest was issued Sept. 29.   Joshua Anthony Blount of Compton and Rachel Salorio of Irvine were also arrested in connection with the shooting.

Anthony Dispensa told jurors in his ex-friend’s murder trial Thursday that there’s an unwritten rule in jail: You snitch, you die. Dispensa, claiming his life has been threatened for taking the witness stand, opted to testify against Joshua Blount anyway. In more than an hour of testimony, Dispensa walked jurors through the events in early August 2006 that eventually led to 23-year-old Israel Maciel’s slaying. Maciel, a Costa Mesa resident who was not a gang member, was killed in a drive-by shooting in the alley in the 1300 block of West Baker Street.

Anthony Dispensa told jurors in his ex-friend’s murder trial Thursday that there’s an unwritten rule in jail: You snitch, you die. Dispensa, claiming his life has been threatened for taking the witness stand, opted to testify against Joshua Blount anyway. In more than an hour of testimony, Dispensa walked jurors through the events in early August 2006 that eventually led to 23-year-old Israel Maciel’s slaying. Maciel, a Costa Mesa resident who was not a gang member, was killed in a drive-by shooting in the alley in the 1300 block of West Baker Street.

Circumstantial evidence and the testimony of a man along for the ride in a deadly drive-by shooting prove Joshua Blount gunned down Israel Maciel in a Costa Mesa alley in 2006, a prosecutor argued in the trial’s closing statements this afternoon. Blount, 24, is accused of murdering the Costa Mesa resident and wounding four of his friends in an August 2006 drive-by shooting. Anthony Dispensa, who is charged as an accessory to murder, testified during the trial that he was in the car with Blount at the time of the shooting and saw him do it. Defense attorneys argue Dispensa was the gunman.

Even when the evidence put a Compton man at the scene of the murder and witnesses testified he did it during the trial, the victim’s family had their doubts he’d be convicted. “They don’t know much about the laws here in the United States, but I kept telling them, ‘No, no, look at the evidence. He will pay,’” Bernice Contreras remembered assuring her cousin Israel Maciel’s parents during the trial. Maciel, 23, was killed in a drive-by shooting Aug. 2, 2006.

Friends, family and neighbors of a 23-year-old man killed in a drive-by shooting filled more than half of the benches at St. Joachim Catholic Church on Friday during a morning memorial service. Many of them, like Nester Contreras, wore black T-shirts bearing Israel Maciel's image and "In loving memory of Israel Maciel, Jan. 22, 1983 to Aug. 2, 2006" on the front. The letters "IM VOV" were printed on the back of the T-shirts. "That stands for Israel Maciel, a victim of violence," said Contreras, Maciel's cousin, who helped carry the dark blue coffin out of the church to the hearse that carried it to Harbor Lawn-Mt.

  Costa Mesa Police this morning announced the arrest of an Irvine man in connection with the Aug. 2 shooting death of Costa Mesa resident Israel Maciel.   Bryce Novoa, 20, is the fifth person arrested in connection with the drive-by shooting and is being held on $1 million bail at Costa Mesa Jail.   On Aug. 2, Maciel was killed and four others were wounded when a man in a silver Chevrolet Impala opened fire in an alley behind apartment buildings in the 1300 block of West Baker Street.

A Compton man’s sentencing for killing a Costa Mesa man in a 2006 drive-by shooting was delayed until mid-August Friday, when defense attorneys said they plan to file a motion for a new trial. Joshua Blount, 24, faces life in prison without parole for fatally shooting 23-year-old Israel Maciel and wounding four of his friends Aug. 2, 2006, in an alley in the 1300 block of Baker Street. Blount faces life in prison without parole because he was convicted of the special circumstance of the killing happening in a drive-by shooting.

Prosecutors dropped charges against an Illinois man implicated in a 2006 Costa Mesa drive-by shooting Friday, days after he testified against the man convicted as the killer. Anthony Dispensa, 23, faced murder charges for allegedly participating in an Aug. 2, 2006 drive-by shooting in an alley in the 1300 block of Baker Street, where 23-year-old Israel Maciel was killed and his four friends were wounded. Dispensa testified against his former friend Joshua Blount last week in Blount’s murder trial for the same incident and identified him as the sole shooter.

Even when the evidence put a Compton man at the scene of the murder and witnesses testified he did it during the trial, the victim’s family had their doubts he’d be convicted. “They don’t know much about the laws here in the United States, but I kept telling them, ‘No, no, look at the evidence. He will pay,’” Bernice Contreras remembered assuring her cousin Israel Maciel’s parents during the trial. Maciel, 23, was killed in a drive-by shooting Aug. 2, 2006.

A Compton man accused of murdering a Costa Mesa man in a 2006 drive-by shooting would be the unluckiest man in the history of bad luck if he were actually innocent, prosecutors sarcastically told jurors Tuesday. Circumstantial evidence and witness accounts pointing to Joshua Blount as the man who shot and killed Israel Maciel in August 2006 are so overwhelming that his innocence would defy the odds, prosecutors said. Deputy Dist. Atty. Matt Murphy is so confident in his case that he told jurors testimony from Anthony Dispensa, who is accused of participating in the shooting and who supports the prosecution’s case, is only a luxury.

Circumstantial evidence and the testimony of a man along for the ride in a deadly drive-by shooting prove Joshua Blount gunned down Israel Maciel in a Costa Mesa alley in 2006, a prosecutor argued in the trial’s closing statements this afternoon. Blount, 24, is accused of murdering the Costa Mesa resident and wounding four of his friends in an August 2006 drive-by shooting. Anthony Dispensa, who is charged as an accessory to murder, testified during the trial that he was in the car with Blount at the time of the shooting and saw him do it. Defense attorneys argue Dispensa was the gunman.

A man accused as an accessory to murder in an August 2006 drive-by shooting told his mother that he was actually the killer, a Costa Mesa detective testified in court Monday. Patricia Morin testified during the Joshua Blount murder trial Monday that her son, Anthony Dispensa, told her that he shot a gun during the Aug. 2, 2006 slaying of Israel Maciel in Costa Mesa and then asked her to be his alibi. Costa Mesa detective Dana Potts corroborated her story, testifying he remembered Morin saying her son admitted to shooting Maciel.

Anthony Dispensa told jurors in his ex-friend’s murder trial Thursday that there’s an unwritten rule in jail: You snitch, you die. Dispensa, claiming his life has been threatened for taking the witness stand, opted to testify against Joshua Blount anyway. In more than an hour of testimony, Dispensa walked jurors through the events in early August 2006 that eventually led to 23-year-old Israel Maciel’s slaying. Maciel, a Costa Mesa resident who was not a gang member, was killed in a drive-by shooting in the alley in the 1300 block of West Baker Street.

Anthony Dispensa told jurors in his ex-friend’s murder trial Thursday that there’s an unwritten rule in jail: You snitch, you die. Dispensa, claiming his life has been threatened for taking the witness stand, opted to testify against Joshua Blount anyway. In more than an hour of testimony, Dispensa walked jurors through the events in early August 2006 that eventually led to 23-year-old Israel Maciel’s slaying. Maciel, a Costa Mesa resident who was not a gang member, was killed in a drive-by shooting in the alley in the 1300 block of West Baker Street.

Cell phone records prove an accused murderer was in the area at the time a Costa Mesa man was killed in a drive-by shooting, prosecutors said Wednesday. An employee from the Sprint cell phone company testified calls from a phone registered to Joshua Blount, 24, show his phone was near the scene of a drive-by shooting around 8 p.m. on Aug. 2, 2006. Defense attorney Barry Bernstein pointed out Blount’s phone could have been up to 10 miles away from any cell phone towers Sprint uses to track its customers’ calls.

  Costa Mesa Police this morning announced the arrest of an Irvine man in connection with the Aug. 2 shooting death of Costa Mesa resident Israel Maciel.   Bryce Novoa, 20, is the fifth person arrested in connection with the drive-by shooting and is being held on $1 million bail at Costa Mesa Jail.   On Aug. 2, Maciel was killed and four others were wounded when a man in a silver Chevrolet Impala opened fire in an alley behind apartment buildings in the 1300 block of West Baker Street.