A hefty gambling debt led to the 2009 confrontation in a restaurant just off the 16th Street Mall that left one man dead and the proprietor accused of murder in the first degree, jurors heard this morning.
Restaurateur Yan “Dave” De Yang, 41, owed “thousands and thousands” to an acquaintance of the victim and another man dispatched that Thursday afternoon to Chopsticks & Sushi to collect a $500 weekly payment, according to Yang’s attorney
By the time the fight was over, Lloyd Running Bear not only had three bullet holes in his stomach, but took two very close-range shots in the back, prosecutors said in opening statements aimed at countering Yang’s claim of self defense. They said the two shots to the back killed Running Bear.
Defense attorney Jud Lohnes pointed out that Running Bear was choking the diminutive Yang when he fired the first shots at a man who towered over him.
“He had to make a split second decision,” Lohnes said. “All he could see was Lloyd Running Bear’s chest in front of him. He fired five times in rapid succession. It was a human response based on adrenhaline and fear.”
Chopsticks employees told police investigating the Oct. 22, 2009 killing that Yang shot downward at Running Bear and had shouted “do not intimidate me” before the fight escalated.
The shooting was the latest in a series of confrontations stemming from Yang’s bad football bets.
Lohnes said Running Bear called Yang and threatened to kill him.
Running Bear, Mahesh Hingorani and his uncle Nand “Nick” Hingorani, to whom the money was owed, paid Yang a visit at the now-closed restaurant the week before the shooting, prompting a 9-1-1 call to police.
In that call, Yang called the three men “animals” and threatened to shoot them if they returned, said prosecutor Isabel Pallares.
“He said … ‘I can shoot them down, okay? I’m not an easy guy, okay,'” Pallares said.
A search of court records shows Yang was convicted on a domestic violence-related charge in 2009 in Adams County.
The defense focused on the 5-foot-2-inch Yang’s small size. Running Bear stood nearly a foot taller and weighed 100 pounds more.
Lohnes argued Running Bear himself was a deadly and “loaded” weapon. An autopsy found meth, cocaine and high levels of alcohol in his blood.
But the defense’s presentation also countered Yang’s earliest statements to the police, where he claimed Running Bear was a former patron booted from the restaurant and back for revenge.
The police investigation into the shooting could also be called into question. Lohnes said investigators failed to secure the scene, take notes in some instances and that a break-in at the restaurant might have harmed evidence.
Jessica Fender: 303-954-1244 or jfender@denverpost.com.
