Kyung Kim’s murder trial has seen a number of false starts, but
not this time.
GILROY –– Kyung Kim’s murder trial has seen a number of false starts, but not this time.
Jury selection began in earnest Tuesday afternoon for the 47-year-old Gilroy woman accused of hiring a Hollister hit man to kill her husband, Young Kim.
The court started with a panel of 70 potential jurors, according to defense attorney David Epps. He expected to review another panel of 70 today and hoped to have a jury picked by the end of the day. If so, he said, opening statements could begin Monday.
Epps expected the trial to last two to three weeks.
Young Kim’s body has never been found. He was last seen on Nov. 13, 1998, in front of the couple’s Rancho Hills Drive home. In February 2003, a jury found Gustavo Covian, of Hollister, guilty of murdering him. Covian is now serving a life sentence without parole in Soledad but is appealing the conviction.
Covian’s brother, Ignacio, and ex-wife, Maria Zapian, accepted plea bargains and received prison sentences this spring for their alleged roles as accomplices. Both had been charged with first-degree murder, which they swapped for voluntary manslaughter.
Bitterness had overcome the Kims’ 24-year marriage, arranged by family in their native Korea. Both of them had extramarital affairs, according to police reports. Police found divorce papers and a divorce cost estimate in the glove compartment of Young Kim’s car after he vanished.
Kyung Kim waited 16 days before reporting his disappearance to Gilroy police.
The Kims owned the Gavilan Restaurant in Gilroy – now operating under new ownership as the Sunrise Cafe. Zapian worked there as a waitress. Another waitress, Sandy Herman, has said she overheard Kyung Kim tell Zapian she hated her husband and wished he was dead. Zapian responded that his death could be arranged for between $10,000 and $15,000.
Epps does not deny this conversation but maintains that Kyung Kim never asked anyone to arrange her husband’s death.
Kyung Kim reportedly told police that after her husband went missing, she met with Gustavo Covian at least four times at the Gilroy Premium Outlets. He demanded nearly $100,000 for killing her husband and propositioned her for sex. She paid him tens of thousands of dollars but never had sex with him, she said.
The reason she paid him, Epps said, is that, “He put a gun in her face and said if you don’t pay me, I’ll kill you and your children.”
Epps has filed a petition for the California Supreme Court to review Judge Robert Ambrose’s decision to let Adrian Vizcaino testify. He is expected to repeat statements he gave in Gustavo Covian’s trial, saying he heard Covian brag about killing Young Kim.
A state appeals court in April put Kim’s trial on hold briefly but then let it continue. The Supreme Court has taken no action so far.
Such appeals are unusual before a trial begins, but Epps says Vizcaino is giving hearsay evidence.
Covian himself has refused to testify, asserting his Fifth Amendment right to remain silent. According to Epps, this denies Kyung Kim the right to confront a witness against her, a right guaranteed by the Sixth Amendment of the Constitution. Epps can still cross-examine Vizcaino, but whatever Vizcaino says could be considered hearsay unless Covian confirms or denies it.
Epps based his appeal on Crawford v. Washington state, a March 8 decision by the U.S. Supreme Court that reinforced a defendant’s right to confront witnesses, asserting that the only reliable way to determine a speaker’s truthfulness is to cross-examine them.
Vizcaino is important to prosecutor Peter Waite because he offers evidence that Young Kim is dead. Judge Ambrose has not let Waite use the fact of Covian’s conviction as evidence in Kim’s trial.
