The estranged husband and nephew of 32-year-old Terry Cheek were convicted of first-degree murder on Thursday, Aug. 22, a killing of the Jurupa Valley woman in 1998 that sent her framed lover to prison for 20 years before advanced DNA technology exonerated him and pointed authorities to the two other men and Cheek’s stepson.
The penalty phase for Googie Rene Harris Sr., 67, and his nephew, Joaquin Latee Leal III, 58, begins Monday at the Riverside County Hall of Justice. The same 10-woman, two-man jury will recommend either they serve life without parole or be executed. Superior Court Judge Bernard J. Schwartz will either affirm their choice or select the remaining option.
Jurors also found true special circumstances allegations against both men that they murdered while lying in wait and an allegation that Harris Sr. killed for financial gain. Googie Rene Harris Jr. testified that his father killed Cheek because he feared he would lose his “dream house” in a divorce.
Those findings made the men eligible for the death penalty sought by the District Attorney’s Office.
The prosecution case was largely circumstantial and relied on the jury believing the testimony of Harris Jr., 45. He testified that on April 14, 1998, Cheek was leaving her home in Glen Avon, which later became part of Jurupa Valley, when her husband and Leal grabbed her in the garage and strangled her.
Leal and Harris Jr. then loaded her body in the pickup of Horace Roberts Jr., with whom she was having an affair and whose pickup she had borrowed on that day, and drove her to Lee Lake near Corona under the cover of darkness and dumped her body on the rocks, Harris Jr. testified. The men left Roberts’ truck about a mile away on the shoulder of the 15 Freeway.
Harris Jr., who had originally been charged with murder as well, cut a deal with the DA’s Office that allowed him to plead guilty to accessory after the fact in exchange for his testimony. He is due to be sentenced to 1 year in jail in September.
His father claimed Leal and Harris Jr. may have committed the slaying, according to his attorneys. Leal testified that he did not kill Cheek but instead arrived at the Glen Avon home to find Cheek already dead and he simply helped Harris Jr. move the body. Leal’s attorneys said Harris Jr. killed Cheek.
“I’m certainly not pleased with the verdict,” said Harris Sr.’s co-counsel, Darryl Exum. “I understand the jury’s verdict. The son testifying against the father was powerful evidence.”
Said Leal’s co-counsel, Peter J. Morreale: “I’m disappointed with the verdict. We’re setting our focus on the penalty phase.”
About a dozen Cheek family members and supporters, including one who clutched a framed photo of Cheek, attended the verdict reading, which came after about one day of deliberations. They said they’d comment after sentencing.
Managing Deputy District Attorney Will Robinson spoke with them afterward, planning their testimony for next week.
“It’s an honor to be able to do everything we can to get justice for them,” Robinson said afterward. The DA’s Office said it would comment further after sentencing.
Cheek was having an affair with Roberts, a co-worker at Quest Diagnostics in San Juan Capistrano. He lied to investigators about the affair and his whereabouts on the night of the slaying in order to avoid breaking workplace rules, he testified in the current trial. A watch that actually belonged to Harris Jr. and a piece of rope found at the lake were linked to Roberts as well. And Cheek’s family members told investigators that, when they collected her belongings from Roberts’ Temecula apartment, they found a distinctive black purse that Cheek had with her the day she vanished.
Harris Sr. attempted to cover his tracks by testifying against Roberts at Roberts’ trials and speaking in favor of continued incarceration at his parole hearings.
The DA’s role in Roberts’ case prompted an apology from District Attorney Mike Hestrin, who was not in office in 1998, after Roberts was released from prison in 2018. Roberts, who was convicted in a third trial after two juries hung, sued the county and was paid $11 million to settle the lawsuit.
Investigators ignored or minimized the bitter divorce that Harris Sr. and Cheek were having that was spelled out in court documents, according to the California Innocence Project, which helped secure Roberts’ freedom by uncovering DNA evidence.
Investigators eventually received test results that showed Harris Jr.’s DNA on the watch and Leal’s DNA under Cheek’s fingernails.
“The conviction of Googie Harris Sr. and Joaquin Leal marks a significant step toward justice, bringing a long-overdue sense of closure to both the victim’s family and Horace Roberts, who unjustly lost 20 years of his life,” said Michael Semanchik, who was with the California Innocence Project when it took up Roberts’ case in 2013 and his now executive director of The Innocence Center and remains Roberts’ attorney.
“It also highlights the urgent need for criminal legal reform to ensure that we identify the right individuals from the start, sparing innocent lives from irreversible harm,” Semanchik said in an email.
Roberts, 66, now living in South Carolina, declined to comment on Thursday’s verdicts, Semanchik said.
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