RAPE DEFENDANT CAN'T WITHDRAW HIS GUILTY PLEA; JUDGE SAYS CONSEQUENCES CLEAR.

Byline: Jesse Hiestand Daily News Staff Writer

A Superior Court judge refused to let a defendant withdraw his guilty plea Wednesday, saying Jose Zavala knew full well he was facing a possible life sentence when he pleaded guilty to raping two Thousand Oaks women earlier this year.

``It's very clear in the transcript that (Zavala) understood in no uncertain terms that he would be sentenced to 50 years to life in prison,'' Judge Herbert Curtis said.

Court-appointed attorney Joel Steinfeld said Zavala felt he had been forced to plead guilty by Deputy Public Defender Joe Villasana and did so only because he believed he would be freed from custody as a result.

Zavala, showing little emotion, told the judge, ``I don't think it's justice - what's going on.''

Curtis said he accepted Zavala's plea only after the defendant said he understood the charges against him and the consequences of pleading guilty.

With Curtis' ruling Wednesday, Zavala, a 22-year-old illegal immigrant from Mexico who has twice been deported for criminal convictions, now faces sentencing Wednesday on two charges of rape and three charges of burglary, which he pleaded guilty to on Oct. 2.

He had been facing trial for burglarizing the homes of, and raping, a 64-year-old woman at the Thunderbird Mobile Home Park on Jan. 25 and a 57-year-old woman at the Camelot condominium complex on Pleasant Way on Feb. 20.

Zavala was arrested on suspicion of those attacks on Feb. 22 when he allegedly tried to strangle a 44-year-old woman in her Sunset Drive home.

Prosecutors agreed to drop charges stemming from the latter attack in return for Zavala's guilty plea to all other counts, according to Deputy District Attorney Tina Nunes-Ober.

But at his sentencing hearing a month ago, Zavala abruptly announced he wanted to withdraw his plea because, as Steinfeld said at the time, the defendant did not like the prospect of spending life in prison.

Steinfeld was appointed to review the case to see if the defendant had any legal grounds to withdraw his plea.

Steinfeld told the judge Wednesday that he had reviewed all reports and transcripts in the case, including Zavala's videotaped statements to police shortly after his arrest and a transcript of the hearing at which he pleaded guilty.

``Based on my analysis and my conversations with Mr. Zavala, I don't believe there's a legal basis on which to withdraw the plea,'' Steinfeld said, adding that Zavala ``is not happy'' with that assessment.

Zavala expressed his reasons for wanting a change of plea in a hand-written letter to Curtis. The judge did not make the letter public and ordered it given back to the defendant, as Zavala had requested.

If he is given a sentence other than life in prison, Zavala again faces deportation when his time is served. He was deported in 1994 after he pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor charge and again in 1996 for a drug case.