She seemed an unlikely gang member. At 5 feet tall and 90 pounds, Ana Cary Ayala Bustos, 16, barely reached the shoulders of some of the sheriff's deputies who escorted her in and out of court during her four-day trial.
But a Snohomish County jury Tuesday found Bustos guilty of second-degree murder for her role in the beating and stabbing death of a rival gang member, Antonio Marks, 17, in Sultan last June.
Bustos could face up to 18 years in prison for the crime. After deliberating about four hours over two days, the jury concluded the 16-year-old participated in the killing to enhance her own gang membership. That finding, called a gang enhancement, allows the judge to impose a prison term beyond the standard sentencing range.
Four other teens, who also tried as adults, pleaded guilty to the killing and were sentenced from 10 to 15 years each.
The victim's mother, Angelina Reyes of Lynnwood, expressed relief that the jury found Bustos guilty of murder and not a lesser offense.
"Now my son can rest," she said.
The killing stunned the small mountain town of Sultan, population 4,500, which is better known for whitewater rafting and fishing than for gang activity. City leaders say they are trying to create more programs for youth to keep them from turning to illegal activity and violence.
Surveillance cameras erected by local businesses and the city to combat vandalism caught the murder on videotape. The tape shows the acknowledged leader of the Sultan Brown Pride Soldiers, Marco Castillo, now 20, knocking Marks to the pavement with a single blow just after midnight June 17.
Castillo pummeled Marks as he lay still in the street. Four other teens crowded around Marks' head and started kicking as Castillo knelt beside Marks' torso and stabbed him six times.
Police said the tread marks of several shoes were found on Marks' face.
Prosecutor Tobin Darrow told the jury that Bustos took her membership in the Brown Pride Soldiers seriously. She carried a backpack with the BPS logo written in pen and sported a tattoo above her elbow composed of three dots in a triangle, the same design and in the same location as that worn by Castillo.
In closing arguments Monday, Darrow told the jury that Bustos was "stomping his [Marks'] head as Marco was wielding the knife" and that she "fully participated in the attack."
Defense attorney Karen Halverson argued that Marks died of the stab wounds, not head wounds. She said there was no evidence that Bustos was an accomplice to the stabbing and little evidence that kicking caused Marks' death.
"Cary did not hurt Antonio Marks. She did not commit murder," Halverson told the jury.
Castillo pleaded guilty to the murder and was sentenced to 15 years in prison in December. Three others — Marco's brother Adolfo Castillo, 17; Jaime Santana, 16; and Ivette Rico, 18 — also pleaded guilty to second-degree murder and were sentenced this winter to 10 years each. The victim's mother also attended the earlier court hearings and was sharply critical of the sentences, noting that the defendants would still be young when they completed their prison terms, while her son would get "no second chances."
Reyes told Judge Ronald Castleberry, during Marco Castillo's sentencing, that her son Antonio was not in a gang. But as she sat through detectives' testimony in the Bustos case that linked Marks to the Lynnwood Southland Villains and referred to Marks by his street name, "Speedy," she acknowledged that she had "been in denial."
"It's gangs. I have to come to grips with that," Reyes said earlier this week.
Marks' sister, Lindsay, said she talked to Antonio the evening he was killed. Court papers say Antonio Marks had fought with his girlfriend, the Castillos' sister, and told Lindsay he was afraid something would happen. Shortly before the fatal confrontation, he called again to say he was OK, that he was catching a bus back to Lynnwood.
"He wasn't a fighter," Lindsay Marks said. "He liked to get down on the floor and play with his nephew. If he got mad at my mom, he'd feel guilty. The day of the murder, we talked about the things he wanted to do in life."
A 2007 survey by the Snohomish County Sheriff's Office found that there were gang members in every city in the county, including 10 in Sultan. Last summer, the Sheriff's Office won a $376,000 grant to continue the work of its Gang Community Response Team, which educates the community about gang activity and works with groups that provide youth services including the Boys & Girls Clubs and the YMCA.
In Sultan, community leaders say they are doing a better job of coordinating activities in a town where kids often complain there is nothing to do, said Dave Wood, service director for the Sky Valley Volunteers of America in the town.
The city has applied for a grant from the state Juvenile Justice Commission to create a teen court aimed at middle-school students who commit minor, nonviolent crimes. Wood said the community also would use the grant to offer family counseling, anger-management classes and substance-abuse intervention and to create a mentoring program for teens.
"There has been progress," Wood said.
Sultan Police Chief Jeff Brand said visible signs of gang activity — tagging, graffiti and teens wearing gang colors — have dropped dramatically. But he said there are still parents working two and three jobs who don't supervise their kids and teens who are bored and searching for a way to belong.
Brand recalled one of the convicted gang members talking last year about her plans to become a firefighter.
"Such a waste," he said.
Lynn Thompson: 206-464-8305 or lthompson@seattletimes.com
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