Sentencing for a Fresno man found guilty last month of murder in the shooting death of Kimberly Harvill has been postponed until the end of May.
Alex Valdez, 31, was found guilty by a jury on Feb. 6, following less than a day of deliberations.
He was to have been sentenced Friday but that date was put over until May 31.
It could not be confirmed by staffers at the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office Monday if more time was needed at sentencing to accommodate the input of victims affected by the shooting who might deliver victim impact statements.
Many of the people involved in the Harvill case are from the Fresno area.
In August 2016, Kimberly Harvill was murdered and her body was discovered in a remote area of Gorman.
Prosecutors said Harvill was killed by 29-year-old Joshua Robertson and Valdez because the victim was a witness to a shooting in Fresno involving the two defendants that occurred days before her murder.
Robertson and the victim’s half-sister, Brittney Sue Humphrey, 24, both of Fresno, kidnapped Harvill’s children ages 5, 3 and 2 after the crime occurred.
The children were later found abandoned in a New Mexico motel. Humphrey and Robertson were arrested later in Colorado and Valdez was arrested in Fresno.
In January, Robertson entered an open, no contest plea to one count of first-degree murder, three counts of kidnapping, two counts of an unrelated arson and one count each of possession of a firearm by a felon and possession of flammable material.
An open plea is a plea that was not negotiated with prosecutors.
Robertson was immediately sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.
Humphrey pleaded no contest to three counts of kidnapping and was sentenced to 13 years in prison in September 2017.
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