SANTA ANA (AP) — An Orange County jury has recommended the death penalty for a 29-year-old man convicted of raping and killing a woman, raping three others and assaulting another.

A district attorney’s statement says the jury recommended the sentence for Waymon Livingston of Stanton on Wednesday. A judge will sentence Livingston on April 26.

The decision came two weeks after the jury found Livingston guilty of three counts of rape and one count of aggravated assault. The jury deadlocked on an additional count of rape involving another victim, and the judge declared a mistrial on that count.

Livingston, whose lawyer argued the sex was consensual, cried when the verdicts were read

Prosecutors said DNA evidence linked Livingston to the assaults, in which he would often choke women into unconsciousness before raping them.

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