JLWOP Inmate Savin Sam
On October 26, 2003 Savin Sam; Somanang Kim; and Bunreth Pech; murdered Lorena Carrasco and attempted to murder three others outside a San Jose home… Carrasco had walked out of her residence with her boyfriend when three men drove by in a white Honda Sedan, and shot all four victims, killing Carrasco. One of the victims, Francisco Guadarrama, was paralyzed from the waist down. None of the four victims had any association to a street gang
On November 29, 2003, the three gang members targeted a rival gang member. Sam shot Adam Noc Chhoeun while he was attending a party. . Chhoeun had recently switched gangs and the shooting occurred just across the street from where one of the murderers lived on San Jose’s Galena Drive.
The third homicide happened just hours later, outside a party that was breaking up in the 1500 block of Galena Drive. Witnesses reported seeing an Asian man wearing a bandana jump onto the hood of a pickup truck and shoot 17-year-old Ervin Perry. Perry died from a gunshot wound to the head and also was found to have no gang affiliation.
This crime spree led to one of the most extensive investigations in San Jose history, resulting in indictments by a Santa Clara County criminal grand jury on three murder counts and 13 counts of attempted murder. All three men were arrested in December 2003 after witnesses to the crimes identified the suspects and lab tests matched bullet casings from the shootings to the same gun. a
On August 28, 2009, Sam was sentenced to life without possibility of parole.
