Pimps father is filled with righteous indignation. "'Who are they to say they are God, to determine whether Calvin lived or died?"



Calvin Sneed, a 22-year old Los Angeles man, was shot dead by a pair of vigilante parents that wanted revenge on the man who they believe pimped out their teenage daughter, according to police.Lupe Mercado, 37, and Barry Gilton, 38, allegedly hunted down Sneed and shot him to death on June 4.

Mr Sneed's father, Charles, is now speaking out - saying that his boy was indeed troubled, but that gave no one the right to gun him down in cold blood.



'Calvin was a pimp, the girl was a runaway, the parents got mad,' Mr Sneed said to San Francisco Chronicle.

'They became God for a moment. They didn't wait for the judge, the trial, they did it right then and there in the street.'

The couple, who have four children together, have been accused of resorting to premeditated murder after legitimate means to rescue their daughter failed, according to the San Francisco Chronicle.
‘They had gone out to local police agencies, agencies in Southern California - they had even tried talking to national organizations,’ Eric Safire, Gilton's attorney, told the newspaper. ‘Every place they turned to turned them away.’

Police said once the couple found out their 17-year-old daughter might be a working prostitute for Sneed, they began a state-wide search for her.Authorities believe the pair were responsible for a shooting last month where someone fired into Sneed's car in North Hollywood - but the gang member from Compton, Los Angeles, escaped unscathed.

When that attempt at killing him failed, the couple are said to have tracked him down in San Francisco in the early hours of June 4. Twice: Authorities believe the pair were responsible for a shooting last month where someone fired into Sneed's car


Prosecutors say Gilton shot Sneed with a .40-caliber handgun on Meade and LeConte avenues, causing the gang member to crash his Toyota Camry. Sneed later died at San Francisco General Hospital.

Charles Sneed said his son had just dropped off the girl near her home in the Bayview neighborhood, but prosecutors said the pimp was in the city to try to get the girl back from her family.

'Who are they to say they are God, to determine whether Calvin lived or died? How come they didn't let a judge do that? They took it into their own hands,' he said.Mr Sneed, a professional welder and handyman, said that he repeatedly tried to make his son leave behind his criminal occupation.

A month before his death, Mr Sneed even tried to stage an intervention for his son.


'I wrote him letters, saying, "You have to realize that you're pimping somebody's daughter, somebody's sister." You know, they might not like that. These people have families out there, I told him that,' Mr Sneed said to the San Francisco Chronicle.

Attorneys for the couple, who have been together since high school, said they did not kill the Nutty Block Crip street gang member.'The motive is all they (prosecutors) have, as far as we're concerned,' Tony Tamburello, Mercado's attorney, told the newspaper. 'This would not be the first time the police and prosecutors got it wrong.'According to criminal records, Gilton was convicted in 1995 of drug dealing and possession.

The pair are being held on $2 million bail on charges of murder, conspiracy to commit murder and one count of discharging a firearm at an occupied vehicle.

Mercado faces 25 years to life in prison and Gilton could be sentenced to life without parole, if convicted.

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