SANTA ANA, CA — A hearing is scheduled for Oct. 3 in a Santa Ana courtroom for attorneys to discuss how to go forward with the case against a 32- year-old man charged with gunning down a bookie he worked with in a Huntington Beach parking lot.
Orange County Superior Court Judge Richard King declared a mistrial Thursday in the trial of Dennis Tri Gia Dang. Jurors, who deliberated for seven days, acquitted Dang of first-degree murder, but deadlocked between second- degree murder and voluntary manslaughter. Seven of the jurors voted for second- degree murder and five opted for voluntary manslaughter.
Dang was charged with murder with sentencing enhancements for discharge of a firearm causing great bodily injury and the personal use of a firearm. He is accused of fatally shooting 48-year-old Linh Ho of Westminster about 12:15 p.m. Oct. 20, 2019, at Magnolia Street and Warner Avenue.
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The defendant’s father, Jimmy Dang, was a “good friend of Mr. Ho,” said Senior Deputy District Attorney Janine Madera, who added that Ho earned a living as a bookie and ran a “tight operation.”
Dennis Dang worked as a “kind of middleman” bookie, recruiting bettors and collecting debts for Ho, Madera said in her opening statement of the trial.
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