‘Our hearts were shattered in a million pieces’: Pittsburg man gets 10 years in prison for 2021 homicide due to self-defense allegations
MARTINEZ — In an emotional Thursday court hearing, a Contra Costa judge sentenced a Pittsburg man to 10 years in prison as part of a plea deal over a 2021 fatal Bay Point shooting, court records show.
Antonino Solis, 30, pleaded no contest to manslaughter in exchange for the 10-year sentence, and prosecutors correspondingly dropped a murder charge against Solis. He was accused of killing 24-year-old Pablo Bretado Munoz in a August 2021 Bay Point shooting, after Munoz and Solis allegedly arranged to fight.
Several of Munoz’s family members came to Thursday’s sentencing hearing to speak out against the sentencing, calling it too short. Munoz had been married just two months before his death and left behind three children, his wife said in a letter to the court.
“Our hearts were shattered in a million pieces,” Munoz’s widow wrote. “Your actions have left (our children) with a permanent void that will never heal.”
She later added that, “Never in my wildest nightmares did I envision I would have to bury my husband so soon.”
Solis’ attorney, Gregory Humphreville, said that he would have argued the killing was self-defense had the case gone to trial. In an interview, he said Solis was under the false impression that Munoz was with Solis’ children and their mother, and that they got into a heated argument. He said Munoz brought “two carloads” of people to fight Solis in Bay Point, one of whom was armed with a motorcycle chain.
Police said at the time that Solis used an assault rifle to shoot Munoz multiple times around 10 p.m. on Aug. 28, 2021, near Willow Pass Road and Bella Vista Avenue in Bay Point.
He was arrested several days later after Concord police spotted him driving. Munoz then allegedly attempted to evade the cops by fleeing towards Bay Point, but crashed his car and was detained while trying to run away, authorities said.
Solis gets credit for the time he spent in jail awaiting a resolution to his case. Before accepting the plea deal, Judge Charles “Ben” Burch acknowledged that the victim’s family disagreed with the sentence, but said it was important to impose some resolution to adjudicated homicide cases — regardless of the actual length of prison time — to signify the loss of human life involved.
The next court date has been set for Sept. 8, where Burch will likely delineate how much restitution Solis must pay. Solis has asked to be present for that hearing, allowing him to postpone his eventual transfer to the state prison system for at least five weeks.