Jury Convicts 2nd Man in 1988 Murder : Crime: His accomplice was sentenced in March to death in the gas chamber for killing a woman who had befriended the pair.

A Soviet Army defector who was once hailed as a hero for escaping from East Germany was convicted Monday of killing a North Hollywood woman who had befriended him.

A San Fernando Superior Court jury, which deliberated four days before reaching a verdict, must now decide whether to recommend life in prison or death in the gas chamber for Peter Sakarias, 24.

Sakarias faces a death sentence because the jury found him guilty of murdering fellow Estonian Viivi Piirisild, 52, with the special circumstance that the killing was committed in conjunction with a robbery and burglary.

Judge Howard J. Schwab will determine the final sentence. Arguments in the penalty phase of the trial are scheduled to begin today.

Sakarias, who had laughed quietly at times while his taped confession to police was played during the trial, showed no emotion when the verdict was announced.

Outside the courtroom, neither Public Defender Daniel Blum, who represented Sakarias, nor Deputy Dist. Atty. Steven J. Ipsen, who prosecuted the case, had any comment on the verdict.

Sakarias’ accomplice, Tauno Waidla, 23, was sentenced in March to death in the gas chamber for his part in the 1988 slaying and burglary.

Sakarias and Waidla had been warmly embraced by the Estonian community in the United States after they defected from the Soviet Army in 1987. Piirisild, who was popular in the Estonian community, had initially supported the two men, even allowing Waidla to live in her home. But the relationship soured when she stopped helping the men because they did not want to support themselves.

On July 12, 1988, the two men broke into Piirisild’s home, knowing that her husband was away on a business trip. When she returned home, Waidla struck her on the head with the blunt end of a hatchet and Sakarias stabbed her four times.

The men used Piirisild’s credit card to buy airline tickets to New York. The men were caught about a month after the killing when they tried to re-enter the United States from Canada, where they had fled.

In the taped confession, Sakarias said Piirisild had told people in the Estonian community nationwide not to help the men any longer, and the two had become hungry and desperate. He said they had planned to kill themselves, but decided to kill Piirisild first so that she would not laugh at their deaths.