The preliminary hearing has begun. Prosecutors say this was a vigilante murder that the parents of the young girl -- who was 17 -- took the law into their own hands and killed her pimp. Lawyers for the four defendants say they're convinced their clients will be acquitted.
"I'm confident the jury will do the right thing and return verdicts of not guilty on all four defendants," said Defense Attorney Eric Safire.
Safire represents the father of the young woman who he says was forced into prostitution by 22-year-old Calvin Snead.
Tony Tamburello is the attorney for the girl's mother. He told us, "She was very concerned and she did everything she could to try to coax her daughter not to stay with this man." Everything, Tamburello says, except murder.
The prosecution sees it differently. The San Francisco Assistant District Attorney Harry Dorfman said, "There was a plan. The plan was executed. He was hunted down on the street and shot dead."
Investigators say Snead had just brought the girl from Los Angeles to her parents' home in the Bayview on June 3rd. The girl reportedly called him the next day and asked that he pick her up at home. Snead was shot to death in his parked car near the house.
Prosecutors say surveillance video taken on the 1400 block of Grove Street the day of the murder shows the father, Barry Gilton, and the other two suspects meeting in the Hayes Valley on the 1400 block of Grove Street. They say one of the suspects rented a car in L.A. and drove it to San Francisco and that the video shows the driver meeting the girl's father and his nephew who drove up in another car.
"We have very clear video of them coming together and leaving the scene," said San Francisco District Attorney George Gascon.
The complaint says they drove to the Bayview and waited for Snead and when he arrived, Gilton shot him in the head. Gascon says the father even tried unsuccessfully once to kill Snead in Los Angeles.
"We have been able to place him near the location of a shooting that occurred in L.A. where our victim was the victim of that particular crime," said Gascon.
Here's one ironic footnote: a source close the investigation tells ABC7 News that two of the defendants Alfonso Williams and Antonio Gilton are associated with a street gang called CDP, which is involved in, among other things, prostitution.
The preliminary hearing is expected to continue into March.
