LAKE COUNTY, Calif. – Federal prosecutors have not yet decided whether they will seek the death penalty in the case of a Kelseyville man accused of shooting to death a convenience store clerk in January.
Last month the US Attorney's Office announced that it was charging 31-year-old Jonathan Antonio Mota for the January murder of 33-year-old Kelseyville resident Forrest Seagrave.
Mota, who is being held in an Alameda County Jail facility in Oakland, made his first appearances in federal court in San Francisco this week on the four counts against him.
He's charged with use or possession of a firearm in a murder, use or possession of a firearm during a crime of violence, robbery affecting interstate commerce and felon in possession of a firearm.
On Wednesday he made a brief, five-minute appearance for arraignment before Magistrate Judge Jacqueline Scott Corley, at which time he was advised of his rights and the charges against him, according to court records.
Mota and his attorney, Richard Mazer, returned to court on Friday for a 20-minute status conference, court filings showed.
The court set another status hearing for Friday, July 19, and vacated a briefing schedule and a previously set motion hearing, with federal prosecutors to provide discovery on the charges against Mota by next week.
While Mota's indictment states that penalties for the charges against him could earn him life in prison, minutes of the Friday hearing noted that the government “has not determined if matter will be treated as a capital prosecution.”
Prosecutors believe it was Mota who arrived masked and armed with a handgun at Mt. Konocti Gas and Mart in Main Street in Kelseyville late on the night of Friday, Jan. 18, in an attempt to rob the store.
Seagrave was shot in a confrontation with the suspect, who fled into the night and initially eluded capture. A short time after the shooting, Seagrave died at Sutter Lakeside Hospital in Lakeport.
Mota, who has a lengthy criminal history – including a prison sentence for a December 2006 Clearlake bank robbery – was arrested in late January for a felony parole violation and a misdemeanor charge of use or being under the influence of a controlled substance.
In February he was indicted by the federal government for being a felon in possession of a firearm and ammunition.
That charge resulted from Mota having allegedly been in possession of a Zastava 7.62 millimeter assault rifle with a large capacity magazine and ammunition at the time of his January arrest.
That indictment was superseded by the case filed against Mota last week for Seagrave's murder.
Mota remained in Lake County Jail custody until April, when he was transported to the Oakland jail facility after federal authorities took custody of him in the weapons case, as Lake County News has reported.
Email Elizabeth Larson at
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