Man gets 433 years for slashings

LONG BEACH - A violent felon convicted of attacking Long Beach area women - including slashing the throats of two - was sentenced Monday to spend the rest of his life in prison.Long Beach Superior Court Judge Gary Ferrari sentenced Charles Juan Proctor, 45, to 433 years, plus 11 life sentences. The defendant was additionally ordered to pay restitution to two victims, totaling $57,790, for their medical expenses and $10,000 to the state victims' restitution fund. Proctor was convicted on Aug. 13 of 22 counts involving six victims. Deputy District Attorney Carol Rose of the Long Beach Branch Office prosecuted the case. Following a five-day trial, jurors deliberated two and a half hours before convicting Proctor of five counts of robbery; three counts each of kidnap for robbery, false imprisonment, and burglary; two counts each of attempted murder and mayhem; and one count each of attempted robbery, attempted kidnap for robbery, assault with a deadly weapon and assault. The majority of Proctor's victims were shop owners attacked at their places of business. The remaining victims were shop employees. The defendant preyed on women who were alone. His attacks began on Feb. 18, 2008, with the robbery, kidnap for robbery and burglary of a woman at a hair salon. Rose said his violent spree resumed daily, with five more brutal assaults from April 26 through May 2, 2008. Four of the attacks were in downtown Long Beach and one occurred in Hawaiian Gardens. One of the most brutal of the attacks was the slashing of a woman who sustained a four-inch wound to the neck, plus stab wounds to her face and head. Proctor went on to slit the throat of a second victim the next day, causing a quarter-inch-wide wound to her neck. Both women survived. Proctor's crimes in Los Angeles County concluded on May 2, when he robbed and attempted to kidnap a woman in downtown Long Beach. Two days later, he was arrested for trespassing in Las Vegas. DNA linked him to a December 2007 attempt to kidnap a woman from a Las Vegas parking lot. During the attack, he cut her throat with a box cutter. In 2008, Proctor was convicted of his Las Vegas crimes and extradited to Los Angeles County. He also has a 1988 attempted sexual assault conviction out of Nevada. Rose said Proctor was linked to the crimes in Long Beach and Hawaiian Gardens by DNA evidence, fingerprints, eyewitness identification and surveillance video footage. He is currently serving a prison term in Nevada for similar crimes.

********** Published: September 2, 2010 - Volume 9 - Issue 20