GUILTY IN VALENTINE’S DAY MURDER

A jury has returned a guilty verdict in a shooting death in Delano in 2015. The second degree murder conviction for 37-year-old Juan Molina, Jr. comes in the death of 28-year-old Adrian Garner on Valentine’s Day. Molina had argued with members of his family that lived at Garner’s house when the victim was not at home. Prosecutors say Molina left and returned with a gun and Garner struggled with him to defend his home and those in it. Garner was shot and killed. Deputy D.A. Joseph Kinzel said, even though the defendant had left, retrieved a weapon and returned, it did not qualify as first degree murder because Molina didn’t even know Garner was home and was not the intended victim when he arrived.