2 Asian Boyz Get Life, No Parole

VAN NUYS —  Two Asian Boyz gang members were sentenced to life in prison without possibility of parole Wednesday, two months after a jury could not agree on whether they should be executed.

Superior Court Judge Darlene Schempp sentenced Sothi Mehn, 24, and Bunthoeun Roeung, 22, to three consecutive life terms. Mehn was also given 122 years in prison and Roeung 90 years.

The widow and the mother of 27-year-old Jon Gregory, who authorities said was fatally shot by the gang during a home-invasion robbery, read separate statements in court.

“While you sit in jail . . . my husband and kid’s father lies in a coffin,” Gregory’s widow, Jennifer, told the defendants. “The only way his family gets to visit him is by sitting by his grave. Tell me how fair that is.”

A jury convicted seven members of the gang in April for their roles in a 1995 crime spree that left six dead.

Deputy Dist. Atty. Laura Baird called the prosecution a success because the state will “take seven violent gang members off the street and keep them in prison for the rest of their lives.”

The four-month trial was marked by the slaying in San Jose of the key witness’ father--a shooting police maintain was carried out in retaliation for the son’s testimony at trial.

David Evangalista, 24; Kimorn Nuth, 21; and Ky Tony Ngo, 23, have already been sentenced to life in prison.

The remaining co-defendants--Roatha Buth, 26, and Son Bui, 22--will be sentenced early next week.