Armed Carjacker in Ukiah Convicted

5 months ago
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A Mendocino County Superior Court jury returned from its time-efficient deliberations mid-afternoon Wednesday to announce it had found the trial defendant guilty as charged.

Defendant Justin Michael Hietala, age 41, generally of Ukiah, was convicted of three violent felonies and knife use sentencing allegations attached to each of the three substantive counts.

The defendant was found guilty of:

(1) Attempted Carjacking from a woman and her two children in the McDonald’s parking lot in central Ukiah the morning of June 24th by his personal use of a knife;

(2) Attempted Carjacking from the same woman and children in the Pear Tree Shopping Center parking lot again by his personal use of a knife on that same date after she had escaped his first attempt across the street; and

(3) a completed Carjacking from a patient transportation vehicle driver waiting to pick up a client at the dialysis clinic on South Orchard by the defendant’s personal use of the same knife on that same date after his first two attempts to get the other car up the street had failed.

All three convictions were entered into the record as felonies.

The law enforcement agencies that investigated and developed the evidence presented at trial were the Ukiah Police Department, the California Highway Patrol, the DA’s own Bureau of Investigations, and the California Department of Justice’s Latent Fingerprints Unit.

Special thanks are extended to the two adult victims for their cooperation with the law enforcement investigation, for their appearance before the jury, and their compelling testimony at the trial.

The prosecutor who presented the People’s evidence at trial was District Attorney David Eyster.

After the jury was excused, a further bench trial was calendared for October 11, 2024 at 10 o’clock in Department A of the Ukiah Courthouse for the prosecutor to present additional evidence not heard by the jury to support the DA’s filed allegations that the defendant’s three-crimes-in-one is an aggravated case.

The defendant’s case will be referred to the Mendocino County Adult Probation Department for a background study and sentencing recommendation and a sentencing hearing date picked after the October 11th evidentiary hearing.

Defendant Hietala will remain in-custody at the Low Gap Jail Facility. His bail was converted to a no bail hold after the verdicts were announced and entered into the record.…Read more by Kym Kemp

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