DEATH FOR NIEVES JURY SAYS MOM SHOULD DIE FOR MURDER OF 4 GIRLS.

Byline: Holly Edwards Staff Writer

SAN FERNANDO - After deliberating more than six hours, a jury recommended Wednesday that a Santa Clarita mother be executed for murdering her four daughters and trying to murder her son in a 1998 arson.

Sandi Dawn Nieves, 36, slumped in her chair and hid her face with a writing tablet as the sentence was read. Deputy Public Defender Howard Waco, who had pleaded with jurors to spare Nieves' life, put his arm around her shoulders.

Waco said Nieves ``broke down'' after the penalty verdict was read and told him that execution would at least offer her the chance to be with her daughters.

``Sandi is deeply grieved for her children and she still does not recall committing the act,'' Waco said. ``She's like a child being punished, and she doesn't know what she did.''

Nieves' two ex-husbands - the fathers of the four girls killed in the fire - expressed mixed emotions after the penalty verdict was read.

David Folden said the recommendation of death brought him no consolation or relief from his grief at losing his two daughters, Jaqlene Marie Folden, 5, and Kristl Dawn Folden, 7.

``To me, there's no satisfaction in it because it won't bring my girls back,'' Folden said. ``I'm glad for the district attorneys in the case, but for me, it really doesn't mean anything.

``I lost my daughters,'' he said. ``I didn't gain anything.''

But Fernando Nieves - the father of Rashel Hollie Nieves, 11, and Nikolet Amber Nieves, 12 - said he was ``happy'' with the verdict.

He also said he wants to attend Nieves' execution so he could ensure the safety of his son, David, now 16, who survived the fire and testified against his mother.

``I would want to see it done with so when I leave this world, I'll know my son, David, will be safe from her and her manipulations,'' he said, adding that the teen did not oppose the death penalty for his mother.

``David sat through the trial and heard the defense accuse him of setting the fire,'' Fernando Nieves said. ``There's still a lot of anger there, and guilt for not disobeying his mother and saving his sisters.''

Charlotte Nieves, stepmother to two of the girls, said the death penalty offers the family a sense of justice, but does not end their pain.

``For us, this will never be over until the day we die because we miss our girls,'' she said. ``They should be here with us enjoying life. They didn't deserve to die.''

The same jury that recommended death took just five hours on July 27 to find Nieves guilty of four counts of first-degree murder with special circumstances, as well as arson and the attempted murder of her son.

After reaching their decision, jurors ate cookies and cake with family members and prosecutors, but would not talk about their decision publicly.

Deputy District Attorney Ken Barshop said the jury's only concern in recommending death was the effect Nieves' execution would have on her son.

``Their one and only concern was, how would David take it if his mother was executed,'' Barshop said. ``But there was no doubt in their minds that it was a just and proper sentence.''

Judge Jeffrey Wiatt will decide whether to accept the jury's decision or impose life in prison in a sentencing hearing scheduled for Oct. 6. All death sentences are automatically appealed to the state Supreme Court.

If Wiatt imposes the death penalty, Nieves would become the 12th woman on California's Death Row, and one of four sentenced to die for killing her children, officials said.

California has executed four women since taking over capital punishment from the counties in 1891. The most recent was Elizabeth Ann Duncan, executed in San Quentin's gas chamber Aug. 8, 1962, for the murder-for-hire of her pregnant daughter-in-law.

In a press conference after the penalty verdict, prosecutors painted Nieves as an emotionless woman who has never suffered remorse or regret about murdering her daughters.

``A mother who deliberately murders her children to exact revenge is guilty of the ultimate crime,'' said Deputy District Attorney Beth Silverman, who argued throughout the trial that Nieves killed her daughters as an act of vengeance against the men in her life.

`'Given the facts and horrendous circumstances of the case, the death penalty is the appropriate verdict, not just because of her crimes, but because of the person she is.''

Officials say Nieves called her children into the kitchen of her Seco Canyon-area home for a slumber party on the night of July 1, 1998, telling them they were going to eat popcorn and watch movies. Nieves then waited for the children to fall asleep, sealed the doors and windows, set gasoline fires in several areas of the house, and ordered her children not to move as they died of carbon monoxide poisoning, officials said.

Waco said key pieces of evidence that would have proved Nieves was brain-damaged and unable to cope with stress were withheld from the jury, and said Wiatt repeatedly thwarted his efforts to tell his client's full story.

Waco's motion asserting that Wiatt should be dismissed from the trial because of the judge's bias against him is still pending. Waco said he might file a motion asking for a new trial during the Oct. 6 sentencing hearing.

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4 photos

Photo:

(1 -- 3 -- color) Sandi Nieves hides her face, above, as her death penalty verdicts are read. Her attorney, Deputy Public Defender Howard Waco, reacts. At right, unidentified jurors hug after reaching agreement in the Nieves case. Far right, Deputy District Attorney Beth Silverman had tears in her eyes as the verdicts were read.

(4 -- color) Fernando Nieves, dad of two of the murdered girls, leaves court with his wife Charlotte.

Charlotte Schmid-Maybach/Staff Photographer