San Mateo, CA: Retrial due in slaying of ex-Raider's daughter

Bob Egelko, Chronicle Staff Writer
Tuesday, March 30, 2010

(03-29) 14:46 PDT SAN MATEO -- San Mateo County will retry the admitted killer of former football star Fred Biletnikoff's daughter for murder after losing a U.S. Supreme Court appeal over the removal of a juror at his first trial, a prosecutor said Monday.

The high court denied review Monday of a prosecution appeal of a July 2009 ruling that overturned Mohammed Haroun Ali's murder conviction for strangling Tracey Biletnikoff in 1999.

Biletnikoff, whose father was a Hall of Fame receiver for the Oakland Raiders, met Ali in 1997 at Project 90, a San Mateo drug and alcohol rehabilitation program where both were being treated. They started dating a year later while recovering from their addictions and helping younger patients.

According to trial testimony, Biletnikoff, 20, found out in February 1999 that Ali had relapsed into drug use and tried to get him back into treatment. They argued at the Project 90 office, where he was working, and he strangled her there with his hands and a T-shirt.

A defense lawyer argued for a manslaughter conviction, saying Ali had been consumed by a violent craving for crack and other drugs when he killed Biletnikoff.

Ali did not testify at the trial but apologized to Biletnikoff's family at his sentencing. He was sentenced to 64 years to life, including nine years for a previous kidnapping conviction in which his sentence had been suspended.

The Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco ruled last year that the prosecutor, Chief Deputy District Attorney Stephen Wagstaffe, had removed at least one black juror for racial reasons.

The trial judge and a state appellate court had accepted Wagstaffe's explanation that the juror might not be objective because her daughter had been the victim of an attempted molestation. But the federal appeals court said Wagstaffe had not objected to white jurors who gave similar responses.

The state attorney general's office argued that the appellate panel should have accepted the trial judge's detailed analysis of the juror removal, but the Supreme Court let the ruling stand without comment.

Wagstaffe said Monday that the prosecution still has a strong case for murder and is prepared to retry Ali, who remains in custody without bail.

The Supreme Court case was Cate vs. Ali, 09-894. E-mail Bob Egelko at begelko@sfchronicle.com.