A 48-year-old Salinas Valley State Prison inmate added more time to his already lengthy sentence of 91 years to life after he was found guilty Tuesday of murdering his cellmate in 2005, as well as two other assaults.
David Gomez murdered Franklin Feliz, his cellmate of two days at the prison, on May 16, 2005. The grisly details are these, according to a statement by the District Attorney’s office: Over the course of about an hour, Gomez strangled Feliz, crushing his voice box, beat his face so severely that it caved in, and cut him multiple times with two inmate-made weapons on his neck and arms.
A correctional officer found Feliz’ body covered in bedsheets in the back of the cell. Despite washing his hands, Gomez still had Feliz’s blood on his arms and legs.
“The verdict was consistent with the evidence,” says Deputy District Attorney Angela McNulty, who prosecuted the case. “This isn’t the first time we’ve seen pretty horrific violence.”
According to testimony at the trial, Gomez allegedly told a prison psychologist that since he was serving a life sentence, Feliz’s murder was a “freebie.”
“[Gomez] seemed to be very proud of what he had done,” she says. “He is narcissistic and likes the attention.
“During his testimony, Gomez said that his lifetime was one of boredom, accentuated by moments of intense action,” McNulty says. “He also said, ‘I am chaos.’”
Gomez was also convicted of two other assaults, both with deadly weapons. Four years after the murder, on Feb. 19, 2009, Gomez slashed fellow inmate Lynford Perry with a small piece of razor while the pair were attending separate hearings in the same courtroom at the Monterey County Superior Court.
On April 14 of that year, Gomez was receiving dental care at the prison and jumped out of his chair, ran across the room while in restraints and jumped on top of inmate Lewis Bruister, stabbing him with a weapon made out of sharpened eyeglass frames.
Since his initial court appearances for the murder charge in 2005, Gomez has been represented by eight different attorneys, attacking many of them in the courtroom. On July 11, within days of being transferred to the Soledad prison for the murder trial, Gomez stabbed a correctional officer in the head with a knife.
In the murder charge, Gomez pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity, but Judge Julie Culver found no evidence to support the insanity plea.
Gomez is scheduled for sentencing on Aug. 20. At time of the murder, Gomez had been in prison since 1998 for rape, forcible oral copulation and first-degree burglary charges.