Former O.C. attorney convicted of strangling ex-wife, throwing her off cruise ship

An ex-Orange County attorney was convicted Monday of strangling an ex-wife and throwing her off of an Italian cruise ship in 2006, with her body discovered floating in the Mediterranean Sea.

Jurors, who sat through a trial that lasted more than three months, deliberated for only a handful of hours before finding Lonnie Kocontes guilty of special-circumstances murder for financial gain for the slaying of his second wife, Micki Kanesaki.

Prosecutors told jurors during closing arguments last week that Kocontes chose the couple’s room on the budget cruise ship, complete with balcony, because it allowed him to drop an object into the sea without hitting any part of the ship.

A pathologist testified that Kanesaki was dead before her body hit the water, and prosecutors alleged that Kocontes believed the body would be lost in international waters and never found.

“The defendant thought he had the perfect plan to kill Micki Kanesaki and make it look like an accident,” Senior Deputy District Attorney Seton Hunt said. “He took his time. He is a planner. He likes control over the situation.”

Another ex-wife, Amy Nguyen, testified that Kocontes told her he wanted to have Kanesaki killed on the ship, alleging Kocontes later said he would have to “take matters into his own hands.”

Nguyen also alleged that Kocontes told her that Kanesaki had proof Kocontes had embezzled money from a client.

Kocontes, during his own testimony, denied that he threatened to kill Kanesaki, or that he defrauded or embezzled from any client. He described taking an Ambien on the ship to fall asleep, then waking up to find Kanesaki missing.

“I absolutely did not kill my wife,” Kocontes said.

Kocontes’ attorney, Denise Gragg, told jurors druing her closing arguments that there is no physical evidence or witness tying Kocontes to Kanesaki’s death. The defense attorney alleged that Nguyen and others who testified against Kocontes were lying.

“Mr. Kocontes doesn’t know how Ms. Kanesaki died,” Gragg said.

Kocontes described Kanesaki as often-depressed and occasionally violent when she drank. Following their break-up – and despite his subsequent marriage to and divorce from Nguyen – Kocontes said he and Kanesaki had reconciled and were planning on re-marrying.

The couple had remained financially intertwined through a Ladera Ranch home that Kocontes said Kanesaki didn’t want to sell. Kocontes acknowledged that several months before the cruise he wrote new wills for he and Kanesaki, which left their assets to each other.

Assistant District Attorney Susan Price said Kocontes was the only person on the ship with a motive to kill Kanesaki. Bill Price, a former police officer and ex-close friend of Kocontes, testified that Kocontes was worried he would have to split his assets with Kanesaki.

“She didn’t deserve to have her life taken from her that night by someone who decided she had no more worth to him,” Price told jurors. “Only one person in this world felt she was holding him back. Only one person felt she was being unreasonable.”

As the trial drew to a close, Kocontes twice attempted to have Gragg removed as his court-appointed attorney.

Gragg had also asked for a mistrial because  social-distancing measures moved the jurors out of the jury box and into the courtroom audience and left public access to the trial limited to an online video stream.

An FBI investigation into Kocontes began after he allegedly tried to move more than $1 million between various bank accounts. Nguyen testified that Kocontes pressured her to lie to a federal grand jury, helping to end the FBI probe.

Price, following a falling out with Kocontes, began working with the FBI. Nguyen changed her story during an appearance before an Orange County grand jury, leading local prosecutors to charge Kocontes with murder.

Jurisdictional questions about whether the Orange County District Attorney’s Office could prosecute Kocontes for a killing in international waters delayed the trial for years. The case was eventually allowed to move forward under the theory the crime had been planned in Orange County.

Kocontes, while awaiting trial, was also charged with soliciting a fellow inmate to kill Nguyen to prevent her from testifying in the murder trial.

Kocontes has denied that allegation and was set to be tried separately on the solicitation charge. It isn’t clear if prosecutors will proceed with that case, given the verdict in the special-circumstances murder trial.

Kocontes is scheduled for a Sept. 18 sentencing and faces life in prison without the possibility of parole.