Getaway driver in Modesto double murder wanted conviction overturned. How did judge rule?
A man involved in a 1979 double homicide in Modesto had his murder conviction upheld in April after attempting to get it overturned using a relatively new state law.
Ronald Ray Anderson, 60, will continue to serve a life sentence for his role as getaway driver in the slayings of Kathy and Phil Ranzo, the Stanislaus County District Attorney’s Office announced earlier this month.
Anderson filed his petition under a California law enacted in 2018 that narrowed the scope of who could be convicted of felony murder when multiple people are involved in the crime. The law limits murder convictions to the actual killers, participants in the related crimes who act with reckless indifference to human life or direct aiders and abettors who share an intent to kill.
Alameda County Superior Court Judge Morris Jacobson found Anderson’s role in the murders still fit under the scope of these new definitions and denied the petition.
On June 25, 1979, Anderson acted as lookout while Marty Spears, Jeffrey Maria and Darren Lee executed a plan to rob the couple of cash the group believed was being kept in the home, prosecutors have said.
Armed with weapons and rope, the three pretended their car was out of gas and asked to use the Ranzos’ phone.
Prosecutors said Phil Ranzo was tied up in the garage, and Spears beat him with a bat and ax, according to previous reporting from the Modesto Bee.
Then Kathy Ranzo was taken to a bedroom where Spears beat and raped her before stabbing her to death, prosecutors said. Spears then returned to the garage and fatally stabbed Phil Ranzo.
Lee and Maria emerged from the house with jewelry and cash about 20 minutes after entering. Anderson said at a parole hearing he believed both of them had witnessed the murders.
Anderson drove Lee and Maria to another location before returning to pick up Spears.
Anderson has claimed he did not enter the house that night, but Jacobson said in his ruling that he didn’t believe this to be true.
According to a witness during the trial, Anderson described how “gross” the house was following the murders. There is also a period of about an hour to 90 minutes that Anderson can’t account for, Jacobson said.
While continuing to serve his life sentence, Anderson can appeal Jacobson’s decision to a higher court.
He also still is eligible for parole but has been denied nine times. He was found suitable for parole in December 2017, but that ruling was overturned by then-Gov. Jerry Brown.
Spears and Maria also had grants of parole overturned around the same time. Lee was most recently denied parole in June 2020.
This story was originally published May 29, 2021 at 6:52 AM.
