Orange County district attorney Tony Rackauckas said he will seek the death penalty against 25-year-old Iftekhar Murtaza for conspiring and murdering his Indian-American ex-girlfriend Shayona Dhanak's father Jaypraykash Dhanak and sister Karishma as well as attempting to murder her mother Leela and setting the victims' bodies on fire.
In March 2007, 18-year-old Shayona, a freshman at the University of California, Irvine, ended a two-year dating relationship with Murtaza since the Dhanaks disapproved of it partly because they were practising Hindus and Murtaza was a non-practicing Muslim, the attorney said.
Murtaza is charged with two felony counts of special circumstances murder, one felony count of attempted murder and one felony count of conspiracy to commit murder.
He faces sentencing enhancements for multiple murders, murder during the commission of a burglary, murder during the commission of kidnapping and murder for financial gain.
He is being held without bail and is scheduled for a pre-trial hearing later on Friday at Santa Ana, California.
Murtaza held Shayona's parents responsible for the break-up because they did not like him and had pressured her to end the relationship, the OCDA said.
After the break-up, Murtaza contacted his friends -- co-defendants Vitaliy Krasnoperov, 24, and Charles Anthony Murphy Jr, 25 -- and discussed ways to murder Shayona's parents, including burning their house down or using a hit man.
Krasnoperov is accused of offering to contact someone whom he knew "used to do this type of work". Murtaza allegedly offered Murphy USD 30,000 "for a job".
The defendants are accused of entering the Dhanaks's home in May 2007 and forcibly restraining Jaypraykash (56), who was beaten, stabbed repeatedly and put in a bathroom while Murtaza waited for his wife and daughter to arrive home.
Later in the night, when Karishma (20) reached home, the defendants forcibly detained her. Leela Dhanak (54) too was attacked and stabbed in the stomach.
Murtaza and his friends then allegedly doused the Dhanaks's Anaheim Hills residence in gasoline, lighting fire to the house. Shayona was then living in the campus dorms.
As per witness, the defendants put Jaypraykash and Karishma in the back of a van and fled from the scene.
The father and daughter were taken to a bike trail at Mason Regional Park in Irvine and murdered. Their bodies were set on fire with gasoline by the defendants, the OCDA said.
Murtaza was arrested while attempting to board a flight to India and was later extradited back to Orange County on June 13, 2007.
