Nunez and co-defendant Jose Diego Perez, 29 – both members of the violent 18th Street gang in Los Angeles – were arrested April 25, 2001, after they kidnapped Delfino Moreno, 34, from in front of his Santa Ana home.
The kidnappers demanded $100,000 in ransom plus a kilogram of cocaine, Deputy District Attorney Ebrahim Baytieh told an Orange County jury in 2003. But Moreno's family alerted Santa Ana police instead of agreeing to pay. And when the defendants spotted undercover officers, they took off in an Oldsmobile sedan.
