Man gets 11 years in prison for killing his wife's ex-wife in new allegations against accused detective

OAKLAND — A Sacramento resident has been sentenced to 11 years in state prison for killing the father of his wife's children in a 2021 shooting.

The settlement came a year after defense attorneys for 34-year-old Donte Neal filed a motion accusing one of the investigators of paying a person to make an “anonymous” call, leading to a pause in the trial. Oakland police officer Phong Tran is already accused of bribing a witness to influence her testimony in another case.

As part of the plea deal, Neal accepted a voluntary manslaughter conviction in the death of 31-year-old Byron Robinson. Prosecutors dropped murder and assault charges against Neal, who was transferred to state prison in late September, records show.

Robinson was shot in the 7400 block of Weld Street in East Oakland on November 6, 2021 at approximately 5:30 p.m. Police allege Neal pulled up next to Robinson's car, fired five shots, drove away and spent the night in Rodeo before heading back to Sacramento.

The case remained unsolved for months. However, court records show that just 48 hours after the murder, Oakland police received an anonymous call accusing Neal and providing Neal's phone number. Police later used this number to determine Neal's presence at the crime scene and questioned him about his number when he was arrested and charged in February 2022.

Brian Cecilio Amaya, an attorney representing Neal, filed a motion last year saying the defense team does not believe the anonymous call was truly spontaneous.

“Similar to the charges on which Officer Tran is currently awaiting trial, the defendant's attorney alleges that Officer Tran paid the 'anonymous' caller to call him, gave him this fake tip, and gave Officer Tran the alleged phone number of the defendant.” Amaya wrote in a legal filing. “This fake 'anonymous call' was used as a basis for probable cause in the warrant to arrest the defendant.”

When police arrested Neal, he allegedly claimed he was in Sacramento the day Robinson was killed and denied ever using his wife's Mercedes, which police say was used in the drive-by shooting was. Prosecutors say his cellphone's location data tells a different story: Neal killed Robinson, stopped briefly in Rodeo and drove the rest of the way back to his home in Sacramento.

At the time of the murder, Neal was on probation for a 2019 assault with a semi-automatic firearm conviction in Alameda County, court records show. His probation ended Jan. 4, a month before his arrest in the case.

Originally published: October 30, 2024 at 11:56 am PDT