A San Gabriel man was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole on Tuesday, March 19 for the 2019 murder of a part-time firefighter from West Covina.
Shaun Cardarelli, 41, was handed the sentence by Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Mike Camacho less than a week after a jury found him guilty of first-degree murder and conspiracy to commit an arson.
Cardarelli and another man, Elijah Thomas Rouse, 23, of San Dimas, were found guilty of ambushing 28-year-old John Brian Mananghaya Aguila after he left for work in apparent attempt to rob him, then stabbing him to death before setting his body on fire.
Rouse pleaded guilty to Aguila’s murder in February. He was also sentenced to life in prison without parole.
After years of delays, both men’s cases played out over less than a month inside the Pomona Courthouse. After a weeklong trial, a jury found Cardarelli guilty of Aguila’s killing after just two days of deliberations.
Cararelli immediately was taken into custody to begin his sentence on Tuesday.
Aguila, who worked as a part-time Bureau of Land Management firefighter, was last seen leaving his home in West Covina on Aug. 22, 2019 on his way to BLM’s office in La Puente.
The next day, firefighters were called to a brushfire that broke out near Mountain and Euclid avenues at around 3:30 a.m. There, they found Aguila’s charred body among the flames.
Two days after that, authorities found Aguila’s Honda Civic abandoned in San Dimas, and evidence of a killing inside the car’s trunk: Gloves and a large amount of blood. Police later obtained surveillance-camera footage showing a man, who was not Aguila, parking the Civic and walking away.
The discoveries led West Covina police to an apartment in La Verne where they arrested three people inside, including Cardarelli.
