Man pleads guilty in fatal shooting of two USC students
One of the two men charged in the slayings of two USC graduate students from China pleaded guilty to two counts of murder in exchange for the prosecution not seeking the death penalty. He will instead serve two consecutive life terms in prison without the possibility of parole.
Bryan Barnes pleaded guilty to two counts of first-degree murder and admitted the special circumstances of multiple murders and murder during the commission of a robbery in the killings of Ying Wu and Ming Qu.
The fathers of both victims, Wanzhi Qu and Xiyong Wu, addressed the court, speaking of the great devastation and loss their families have suffered when their children were killed "for no reason," according to the L.A. County district attorney's office.
The students were fatally shot while sitting in Qu's parked BMW on a rainy April night in 2012, in the 2700 block of Raymond Avenue in Adams-Normandie.
Barnes, 21, was arrested along with Javier Bolden, 20, in 2012 after Los Angeles police detectives from the Southwest Division were able to connect Wu's stolen black iPhone to the suspected gunmen.
Bolden is expected in court in Department 102 on March 21 for a pretrial conference, according to a news release.
Read more: Killer gets life in fatal shootings of two USC students from China
-- Richard Winton and Maloy Moore
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