2 Men Charged in Slaying, Other Crimes

Calling it one of the worst crime rampages in the San Gabriel Valley, prosecutors Tuesday charged two men with the murder of an Altadena woman last week and more than 70 felonies, including three attempted murders, numerous car thefts, assaults and seven violent home invasion robberies.

Jason Mency of Monrovia and Lamin Johnson of Pasadena, both 23, showed little emotion at a court appearance as a judge ordered that they be held without bail pending their arraignment on the charges that include murder during the commission of a crime, which allows prosecutors to seek the death penalty. Arraignment was set for Jan. 21.

Mency and Johnson were arrested Friday at a Monrovia home shortly after allegedly shooting Marsha Lee Birch to death outside her Altadena home.

The mother of four, who died in her husband’s arms, had been preparing to leave for work when she saw the pair breaking into a car nearby and they saw her, authorities said.

Pasadena Police Cmdr. Gary Bennett said the two were caught when undercover police officers from a joint investigation team conducting surveillance on the Monrovia house saw the pair throw a purse away. The officers found Birch’s identification in the purse.

Authorities said they believe the crimes, which occurred in Pasadena, Altadena and San Marino, began on Sept. 15 and escalated to violence on Oct. 26 with the shooting of a security firm employee after he ticketed a car parked on Queensberry Road in Pasadena. The next month, authorities alleged, the pair shot at a man who witnessed a Pasadena car burglary.