'Fags Die' Killer Wins Court Point

Party animal/prostitute/tree trimmer Gregory Pisarcik had hoped an OC jury would see him as the victim of his, well, dead victim, a retired gay INS agent. It didn't work out that way. More and more, juries here aren't buying the "gay panic" defense, and now the 28-year-old killer is in prison. But good news comes to those who wait.

Last week, the state court of appeal based in Santa Ana overturned Superior Court Judge Frank F. Fasel's sentencing decision. The appellate court said Fasel must reward Pisarcik two days of credit for time served in the OC Jail before he was shipped to prison. We can only guess what Pisarcik would do with those two new days of freedom.

In 2002, he picked up Narciso Leggs at a Laguna Beach gay bar, went with him to Leggs' Tustin apartment, stripped and then proved Hannibal Lecter a cuddly kitten. He viciously clubbed, hogtied, mutilated, robbed and then murdered the 55-year-old known for his sweet disposition and charitable attitude. Pisarcik wrote "FAGS DIE" on Leggs' back, shoved a huge industrial flashlight deep into his rectum, cut off his ears and urinated on the dying man. Next, he walked to the kitchen refrigerator, got something to eat and showered, forensic evidence proved.

Days after the killing, Ventura County cops saw Pisarcik driving Leggs' car. A dramatic, televised highway chase ended at a farm with the defendant surrounded, threatening suicide and smoking a final bowl of meth. When he was caputured, he told police, "Don't put me in with the homos. I'm not a homo. That's why I killed him. I am not a homo."

Of course, life now for Pisarcik is nothing but raining men. Even worse, the two days' credit the court awarded him is essentially meaningless. Judge Fasel had sentenced him to life in prison without the possibility of parole plus two years.

Now the punishment is life plus one year and 363 days.

Pisarcik had also asked the justices to overturn his conviction because of alleged "insufficiency of evidence" and prosecutorial misconduct by Deputy District Attorney Matt Murphy—one of the best homicide prosecutors in California. The state court entertained those arguments too, and then quickly dismissed them.