Trial Begins for Woman Accused of Killing 4 Daughters in House Fire

SAN FERNANDO —  On this much both sides agree: Sandi Nieves was a deeply troubled woman whose four daughters died, choking on smoke, after their Saugus house was deliberately set on fire.

But should the mother be held responsible for the girls’ horrible deaths?

The answer is a definitive yes, prosecutors said Monday during opening statements for Nieves’ capital murder trial in San Fernando Superior Court.

“The defendant in this case did the unimaginable, and we will prove that to you,” said Deputy Dist. Atty. Beth Silverman, in the courtroom of Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge L. Jeffrey Wiatt.

Evidence will show that Nieves is manipulative, and out of anger against the men in her life, Silverman said, “The defendant murdered her four young daughters.”

Sketching a vastly different portrait, her defense attorney called the 36-year-old woman a “lost child” who endured years of physical and emotional abuse but was herself a loving mother.

“Sandi Nieves grew up in a dysfunctional home,” said Deputy Public Defender Howard Waco. “The district attorney accuses Sandi of starting the fire with the intent of killing her family and herself. . . . She had no such intent.”

At one point, Waco suggested that Nieves’ teenage son, who was also in the house but survived with burns on his fingers, might be the one who set the fire.

“You’ll see by the time this trial is over that Sandi was as much a victim as her children,” Waco said.

As her attorney spoke, Nieves--who wore a dark green and black suit--hung her head and wept, occasionally audibly. She faces four counts of first-degree murder for the July 1998 deaths of Kristl and Jaqlene Folden, 5 and 7 respectively, and 11-year-old Rashel and 12-year-old Nikolet Folden-Nieves. She also faces charges of attempted murder of her son, David Nieves, and arson causing great bodily injuries. If convicted, she faces a possible death penalty.

On Monday, attorneys for both sides outlined Nieves’ tumultuous life, which included two ex-husbands and a lover who dumped her.

“The defendant found herself alone, with three failed relationships, five children and no money,” Silverman said. “The defendant wanted to punish the men in her life.”

In the early-morning hours of July 1, 1998, Nieves gathered her children for a slumber party in the kitchen, Silverman said. David Nieves, who was 14 at the time, woke in the middle of the night, eyes and throat burning from the fumes. He later told investigators that his sisters wanted to leave the house but their mother told them to stay put and breathe into their pillows. The next day, the boy found his sisters lying still “with foam on their mouths,” Silverman said.

Physical evidence includes a two-gallon canister containing gasoline found in Nieves’ bedroom, gasoline on the carpet, and Nieves’ fingerprints on the canister, Silverman said.

Hours before the fire, Nieves mailed a letter to ex-husband David Folden, who was also once married to her mother.

“Now you don’t have to support us anymore . . . you scum,” Silverman said, reading aloud from the handwritten note bearing the letterhead “Sandi D. Nieves.”

In his opening statement, Waco described Nieves as a loving mother who gave her children piano lessons and a law-abiding citizen who once harbored dreams of becoming a Los Angeles police officer. But because of her difficult childhood and bad relationships with men, Waco said, Nieves had an identity crisis and low self-esteem.

He painted a portrait of Nieves’ own mother as a “sick parent” who married six times, and separated Sandi from her father.

Waco also showed jurors pictures of Nieves’ dead brother, who died of a heroin overdose in 1991. Nieves’ mother, who was an embalmer, sent Nieves photos of “her handiwork,” Waco said.

The men in Nieves’ adult life were unfaithful or controlling, he added. In a letter to her first husband, Fernando Nieves, the woman wrote: “I feel so lost, hurt, abandoned and alone. . . . I’m going crazy. Is it a breakdown or what?” Waco read aloud.

“She was a woman unraveling over a period of time,” Waco said.

Excerpts from “A & E Detectives,” a reality-based television program, also show homicide investigators from the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department trying to “corrupt the truth,” Waco said.

The video clips played in court Monday showed Sgt. Delores Scott, a detective investigating the case at the time, telling a handwriting analyst: “We don’t want to get into any negative evidence. . . . From what you see do you think you can do something with that?”

A second excerpt showed Scott, who was in court Monday, discussing an item of evidence with a prosecutor on the phone.

“The reason we didn’t give it to you right away is because we figure the defense can wait a little bit. You know what I’m saying?” said the detective, laughing.