2 Gang Members Plead Guilty to Kidnap and Rape at Beach

Two Ontario gang members pleaded guilty Tuesday to kidnaping and sexually assaulting a woman after tying up her boyfriend while the couple were at Crescent Bay Beach in July, 1993.

The crime outraged and terrified Laguna Beach residents because the shotgun-wielding suspects were not captured for nearly eight months and most residents in the coastal community consider their beaches a haven from crime.

Floyd Robert Sullivan, 19, and Robert Robles, 23, pleaded guilty in Orange County Superior Court to 14 felony counts, including kidnaping, rape, sodomy, assault, robbery and false imprisonment. Sullivan faces 20 years in prison and Robles faces 60 years in prison when they are sentenced March 3, Deputy Dist. Atty. Dan McNerney said.

Authorities said the couple were sitting on the beach about 1 a.m. when Robles, Sullivan and a teen-ager approached carrying a shotgun and a baseball bat. The boyfriend was bound at gunpoint and the woman was also tied up, taken to another site on the beach and repeatedly sexually assaulted, officials said.

The juvenile who participated in the attack was convicted and sentenced to the California Youth Authority, McNerney said. Defense attorneys for the defendants could not be reached for comment late Tuesday.