Killer gets 25-to-life for `butchering' his child's mom
Judge rebukes mental illness ploy used by sword-wielding slayer
REDWOOD CITY » Convicted killer Jose Rafael Solano Landaeta was sentenced to at least 25 years in prison Tuesday for nearly beheading his daughter's mother with a sword two years ago on a suburban San Carlos street.
Solano, 34, stared ahead and did not speak as the sentence — which could extend to life in prison — was handed down at the Hall of Justice in Redwood City. The ruling came after a jury convicted the Hayward man of murder in the Sept. 8, 2022, slaying of Karina Castro, 27, which happened in broad daylight as passersby looked on in horror.
In a scathing rebuke, San Mateo County Judge Lisa A. Novak excoriated Solano for using “every avenue imaginable” to try to avoid responsibility for the gruesome killing. The evidence was so bloody and stomach-turning that Novak took the unusual step of shielding some pictures of the crime scene from onlookers in the gallery.
“This is by far the most difficult trial I've ever presided over, because of the true horror of the crime you committed in butchering Karina Castro,” said Novak, adding that she was limited by state statute in how long she could incarcerate the man.
Over and over, Novak chided Solano for blaming his actions on mental illness — particularly after a parade of experts testified at trial that he appeared to be “malingering,” or feigning symptoms. The judge called his actions an “affront” to people whose mental health was truly suffering.
“You are clever enough and manipulative enough,” Novak said. “You have utilized your mental illness in an effort to relieve yourself of the criminal liability in this case. It was not successful.”
As she spoke, Solano appeared to stare unflinchingly at a courtroom wall to the left of the judge.
His only words came when he acknowledged understanding his rights at the end of the hearing.
The sentence included a term of 25 years to life in prison with the possibility of parole. Solano also must serve another year on top of that sentence for using a deadly weapon. That means he must spend at least 22 years behind bars before being eligible for parole.
That Solano could one day sit before a parole board was of dire concern to Castro's family, who questioned why state statutes allowed him to one day ask to be set free. His “horrific” actions should have left him facing the death penalty, said Castro's grandmother, Danielle Gannon, who wore a shirt emblazoned with a picture of Castro and her two daughters, ages 8 and 3.
The oldest of those girls still has nightmares of a man with a knife, Gannon said.
“Please, punish this monster to the fullest extent that the law allows,” she asked the judge. “Continue to protect her daughters, and any other female who has the misfortune of coming into contact with this purely evil man.”
Solano's culpability in the attack was not in doubt before jurors found him guilty in November of first-degree murder. Eyewitnesses recounted watching the slaying unfold in the afternoon onf Laurel Street, not far from where Castro lived. They testified that they were walking by when they saw Solano and Castro argue, then watched in horror as Solano retrieved a sword from his car and brutally attacked a fleeing Castro.
Solano even offered a confession of sorts when he returned to the crime scene and reportedly told a San Mateo County Sheriff's deputy, “She was trying to kill me, I'm sorry.”
Throughout the threeweek jury trial, prosecutor Josh Stauffer contended that Solano was driven to kill Castro out of vengeance as their toxic relationship devolved into threats and insults sent by social media and text message.
Stauffer dismissed Solano's legal defense, which right before trial pivoted from an insanity defense to one of imperfect selfdefense, including claims that Castro attacked him first with a small knife. He called this theory a fabrication that did not align with the viciousness of the sword attack in which witnesses testified that Solano hacked at a prone Castro's head and neck “eight to 10 times” after he nearly hacked off her arm with a single swipe of his sword.
“This isn't self defense. This was a man enraged,” Stauffer said in his closing arguments at the end of the trial. “He brutally murdered Ms. Castro, brutally murdered her, and then he played games with you.”
Called to testify in his own defense, Solano seemed to shut down mentally and physically during cross-examination and fell into a stupor. During his brief answers, Solano claimed to not recognize a photo of Castro and denied killing her, a fact not in dispute at trial.
But Solano's defense team argued that the defendant's behavior was indicative of legitimate effects from diagnosed paranoid schizophrenia.
It was just an act, maintained her father, Martin Castro. On Tuesday, he wept in the back of the courtroom during the proceedings. Afterward, he expressed relief at never having to sit in that gallery again.
Instead, he planned to go home and sit next to his daughter's ashes beside his bed. In that moment, even with his daughter's killer finally sentenced, he expected to find little closure.
“Time is not healing any wounds for me. It's making things worse,” Martin Castro said. “My closure will be the day I die.”