Charles ” Chase ” Merritt, the Inland Empire man convicted of murdering a business collaborator and the partner’s partner and two children, is scheduled to be sentenced Friday, Jan. 17, in Superior court in San Bernardino.
A jury on June 24 recommended that Merritt, 62, be put to death for three of the assassinates and life without parole for a fourth. Judge Michael A. Smith can choose between death or life without parole.
Merritt was imprisoned June 10 of first-degree murder in the deaths of Joseph McStay, 40, his wife, Summer, 43, and their two children, Gianni, 4, and Joseph Jr ., 3. Jurors too agreed with a special circumstance of multiple murders. The same jury recommended last-minute recommended three death sentences and life without parole in the death of Joseph McStay Sr ., the business partner.
Merritt has lived in Homeland, Apple Valley and Rancho Cucamonga.
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Prosecutors told jurors that Joseph McStay was hemming Merritt out of their San Clemente water-feature sales and product business partnership. Prosecutors said McStay told Merritt on Feb. 1, 2010 that Merritt owed him $42,845, and at the time the McStay family disappeared, McStay was chipping Merritt out of the business because of poor rendition. The family faded from their Fallbrook home Feb. 4. They formerly lives in San Clemente.
Merritt maintained his innocence in all regions of the trial.
Merritt was arrested and accused in November 2014 – a year after the McStay family’s skeletal remains were discovered in two shallow life-and-deaths west of the 15 Freeway near Victorville. A three-pound sledgehammer that investigators said was used to kill the family was buried along with their remains.
Read more: ocregister.com.