The penalty phase continued Tuesday for Alberto Sierra, a Miami-Dade man who has admitted killing his estranged wife, Gladys Machado, 29, and her two daughters, 6-year-old Julia Padrino and 3-year-old Daniela Padrino, in a 2012 triple homicide.
Sierra’s mother, Mercedes Pedraza, took the stand through a Spanish-language interpreter. She told jurors that after the arrest her son said, “Mommy, everything is going to be OK. Don’t worry.”
Asked whether she would stand by him if he received life in prison without parole, Pedraza said yes, but she added that she did not excuse what he did. “He is my son,” she said.
Sierra’s defense team is asking for a life sentence. It wants jurors to weigh his Type 1 diabetes, a hospitalization tied to the disease, and a car accident when he was a minor that the defense says affected his brain. Pedraza said her son seemed more uneasy after the crash.
The state is seeking the death penalty. On cross-examination, lead prosecutor Abbe Rifkin noted that Sierra learned English after the accident. Pedraza also said her son had struggled in school before the crash and that she knew he smoked marijuana.
Sierra teared up while his mother spoke, the most emotion he has shown in court so far.
