By Bee Staff
Bee researcher Linda Beymer contributed to this report
A man who kidnapped and raped a Sacramento store executive and a man who killed his wife because she refused to have sex are among five Sacramento area inmates who have parole hearings scheduled in the next two weeks, according to the State Board of Parole Hearings.
The convicts are:
-Vaitafe Eti Fruean, 52, California State Prison, Solano.
A Sacramento Superior Court judge sentenced Fruean to life in prison for the January 1977 kidnapping, robbery and rape of a woman after she left her job at a Sacramento area shopping mall, The Bee reported.
The woman was left nude in a field in Placer County. The attack was part of a crime spree by Fruean and Robert Raymond Peterson that included other robberies and another kidnapping.
Peterson also was convicted and sentenced to life in prison.
-John Barry Estep, 53, California State Prison,
Solano.
A Sacramento Superior Court judge sentenced Estep to 19 years to life in prison for killing his estranged wife with a shotgun on July 4, 1993.
The prosecution said Estep attacked the 40-year-old woman after he lured her to his Sacramento house with the promise that she could retrieve the family car.
When she refused to have sex with him, the prosecution said, he killed her. Estep then shot himself, but recovered and was convicted in 1995 after one mistrial.
-Edward Vincent Grabowski, 58, California State Prison, Solano.
A Sacramento Superior Court judge sentenced Grabowski to life in prison for attempting to murder a 29-year-old woman on Jan. 26. 2000 at a Sacramento residence.
-William Emerson Townsend, 42, California State Prison, Solano.
A Sacramento Superior Court judge sentenced Townsend to life in prison for stabbing to death his girlfriend's son-in-law on June 6, 1997.
Townsend killed Mark Anthony Montgomery, 26, with a butcher knife. Montgomery angered Townsend when he parked his car at the girlfriend's Sacramento.
-John Pua Wright, 47, Calipatria State Prison.
A Sacramento Superior Court judge sentenced Wright to life in prison for a March 21, 1983 stabbing attack at the state prison in Folsom.
Wright slashed a fellow inmate, who survived. Wright already was serving a life term for murder.
If you want to give your opinion of an inmate's suitability for parole, you may mail a letter to:
Martin Hoshino, executive director
Board of Parole Hearings
1515 K Street
Sacramento, CA 95811
For more information on the Board of Parole Hearings, go to:
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