Robert R Fitzgerald

Up until the moment he declared that Sheryl Lynn Massip was insane when she ran over her infant son, Robert R. Fitzgerald was not sure how he would rule in the troubling case. Before making up his mind in court Friday, the Orange County Superior Court judge looked to both lawyers for guidance: Was there any legal authority for him to find Massip insane after a jury had, in painstaking deliberations, found just the opposite?

Superior Court Judge Robert R. Fitzgerald was about to resume the bench after a lunch break one day when he was informed that Tommy Thompson's death sentence had been upheld by the state Supreme Court. "There is a God," the judge remarked. Thompson, convicted in 1981 of murdering a Mission Viejo woman, is one of six men Fitzgerald has sentenced to die in the gas chamber at San Quentin State Prison. No other judge in Orange County has sent more defendants to Death Row.

Superior Court Judge Robert R. Fitzgerald was about to resume the bench after a lunch break one day when he was informed that Tommy Thompson's death sentence had been upheld by the state Supreme Court. "There is a God," the judge remarked. Thompson, convicted in 1981 of murdering a Mission Viejo woman, is one of six men Fitzgerald has sentenced to die in the gas chamber at San Quentin State Prison. No other judge in Orange County has sent more defendants to Death Row.

The INS has begun deportation proceedings against Joeri DeBeer, the Dana Point youth convicted of killing his legal guardian, who had sexually abused him. DeBeer was arrested earlier this month because he had committed a crime of "moral turpitude," said Harold W. Ezell, western regional commissioner for the Immigration and Naturalization Service. Because DeBeer was convicted of manslaughter, he is in violation of his non-immigrant student status, Ezell said Saturday.

Re the recent Massip decision: Does Superior Court Judge Robert R. Fitzgerald feel that the jury had no conscience or, in his comment, "There is a God," does he believe he is it? JUDITH M. TULL Anaheim

A Brea man was found guilty of murdering an Irvine woman and then raping her, a special circumstance for which he could face the death penalty. Robert L. Sellers, 28, admitted to authorities that he had become obsessed with Savannah Leigh Anderson, 22, who lived at an apartment complex where he was moonlighting as a security guard while serving in the Marine Corps. When she rejected his romantic overtures, Sellers said, he went into a rage and killed her in May, 1979.

The immigration and Naturalization Service has begun deportation proceedings against Joeri DeBeer, the Dana Point youth convicted of killing his legal guardian who had sexually abused him. DeBeer, 18, who was born in the Netherlands, committed a crime of "moral turpitude," and is in violation of his non-immigrant student status, said Harold W. Ezell, Western regional commissioner for the INS.

Up until the moment he declared that Sheryl Lynn Massip was insane when she ran over her infant son, Robert R. Fitzgerald was not sure how he would rule in the troubling case. Before making up his mind in court Friday, the Orange County Superior Court judge looked to both lawyers for guidance: Was there any legal authority for him to find Massip insane after a jury had, in painstaking deliberations, found just the opposite?

A judge today set aside a jury's second-degree murder conviction and ruled that Sheryl Massip, 24, of Anaheim was innocent by reason of insanity when she killed her colicky infant son, Michael, who was run over by her Volvo before being dumped in a trash can April 29, 1987. Superior Court Judge Robert R. Fitzgerald said that the prosecution failed to prove malice aforethought and that the defendant "was legally insane at the time she killed her son."

A man who remained a fugitive after being convicted of sexually molesting three Costa Mesa girls in 1977 is likely to spend at least 28 years in prison, City News Service reported Friday. George England, 62, was sentenced to one year to life in prison by Orange County Superior Court Judge Robert R. Fitzgerald, who ordered that terms on four counts be served consecutively.