Alleged Burglar Accused of Causing Fatal Heart Attack

A Municipal Court commissioner Tuesday ordered an alleged burglar held for trial on murder charges, ruling that he may have so frightened a burglary victim that she died of a heart attack.

If found guilty, Alfonso Blackmon, 25, of Van Nuys, could be sentenced to 85 years to life in prison because a conviction would be a “third strike” against him.

He will be arraigned in Van Nuys Superior Court on April 25.

At Tuesday’s preliminary hearing, police officers testified that at 11:17 p.m. on Nov. 12, Janet Doering, 60, of Canoga Park, called 911 to report a residential burglary.

When police arrived at her home on Ponce Avenue, the burglar had already left, but Doering still appeared visibly shaken, with perspiration above her upper lip and she spoke in a rapid voice, police testified.

Doering told police she had a heart condition, but said she did not need medical attention. However, after calling her son on the telephone, Doering collapsed in front of police. She was pronounced dead of a heart attack at midnight at a nearby hospital.

A police fingerprint expert also testified that prints taken from a bathroom window screen matched those of Blackmon. Blackmon was arrested Jan. 18 after he was summoned by his parole officer, according to Deputy Dist. Atty. Robert A. Dver.

Blackmon was on parole for a 1991 attempted robbery conviction. He also was convicted in 1988 of robbery.

Blackmon’s attorney, Deputy Public Defender Robert Fefferman, argued unsuccessfully that because the window screen is a movable object, there was no proof it belonged to Doering’s house. Fefferman also argued that it was not the burglary but the woman’s heart condition that caused her fatal heart attack.

“It’s an extremely weak case,” Fefferman said outside the courtroom. “The only reason prosecutors filed the murder charge is that they want to tug at the emotions of the public about the elderly being at risk.”

While noting that it will be a difficult case to try because it is not a typical slaying with a weapon, Dver said the law allows for filing murder charges when a felony act leads to someone’s death.

“To not have filed a murder charge would have been to virtually ignore that this woman died,” Dver said.

Under the state’s “three-strike” law, a person convicted of a third serious felony faces a mandatory 25 years to life or three times the usual maximum sentence for the crime, whichever is greater. In addition, five years for each prior conviction is added to the sentence.

Because murder carries a maximum sentence of 25 years to life, tripling the sentence and adding 10 years for his two prior convictions bring the total maximum sentence Blackmon faces to 85 years to life.