SANTA ANA — A 26-year-old man has been sentenced to 15 years to life in prison for his part in the fatal beating of a homeless man in Westminster, his attorney said Monday.
Andrew Holguin of Midway City was convicted March 27, 2024, of second- degree murder with a sentencing enhancement for gang activity. Holguin was convicted with co-defendant Christian Huerta, 25, who was convicted of voluntary manslaughter, has served his time in the June 20, 2019, killing of 45-year-old Duc Le.
Holguin was facing 25 years to life in prison, but received the lesser sentence on Friday, his attorney, Roger Sheaks, said. Holguin, who has been in custody since July 25, 2019, has nearly six years of credits behind bars, Sheaks said.
Holguin and Huerta faced more years in prison on a charge of participating in gang activity, but in a non-jury trial he was acquitted of that.
Another suspect — Jeffrey Andrade — remains at-large and a fourth defendant was tried as a juvenile.
Le’s body was found at about 10 p.m. June 20, 2019, on Locust Street just south of Westminster Boulevard, police said.
Half of Le’s ribs were broken along with his jaw, Deputy District Attorney Lisa Harris said in her opening statement of the trial.
The assailants “saw an easy target” in Le, a “homeless man sleeping on a couch,” Harris said.
One witness saw “them punching and kicking and at first didn’t know a human being” was the target, Harris said.
Then the witness saw the attackers “drag him across the street” and through a construction site as “his hair came out of his scalp,” Harris said.
At some point, something “came over” Holguin and he “bashed (Le) over and over again with his skateboard, and if he wasn’t already dead yet he certainly was now,” Harris said.
The victim was born in Vietnam before emigrating to the United States, Harris said.
Prosecutors said Le had mental health issues and would drift in and out of homelessness.