The legal saga surrounding the killing of a California art dealer nearly 17 years ago finally came to a close this year, when two men convicted in an elaborate grift and murder plot were sentenced to life without the possibility of parole.
The case was derailed for years by allegations of bias — allegations that emerged after a judge was secretly recorded making derogatory comments about two defendants described by prosecutors as the con artists who orchestrated the plot to take Cliff Lambert’s money, identity and life.
All six people charged in Lambert’s 2008 killing in Palm Springs, the desert city in California’s Coachella Valley, were either convicted or pleaded guilty more than a decade ago. But the secret recordings — which were made illegally by one of the defendants during his 2012 trial — prompted a series of overturned convictions and new trials for four of the accused.
For more on the case, tune in to “The Prince, The Whiz Kid & The Millionaire” on “Dateline” at 9 ET/8 ET tonight.
One of those defendants was fatally assaulted awaiting retrial. The three others were convicted again after a new round of trials that ended two years ago. All are appealing their convictions.
Even after those verdicts, sentencing for two of the defendants stalled for months — and in one case, more than two years — amid claims of ineffective lawyering and health problems. In April and July, Daniel Garcia, 43, and David Replogle, 76, finally received their punishment.
“I should be happier than I am, but I am just so frustrated,” the prosecutor who handled the first set of trials said after Garcia’s sentencing. “I am so angry that it took this long.”
The murder
Lambert, 74, was killed at his home on Dec. 5, 2008, during what he believed was a meeting with a lawyer acting on behalf of a deceased art collector, an appeals decision in the case shows.
According to former Riverside County Deputy District Attorney Rob Hightower, the man posing as a lawyer was actually Kaushal Niroula — a San Francisco grifter who previously claimed to be an exiled prince from Nepal who was one of the architects of the plan to defraud and murder Lambert.
During one of the trials, Hightower said the other architect was Daniel Garcia, described by a onetime close friend as knowledgeable, charming and well-traveled — someone who could enamor everyone he met.
Garcia had also captured media attention in San Francisco a few years earlier when he sued a prominent local financier, Thomas White, over allegations of sexual abuse. White, who died in 2013, settled with Garcia and a second plaintiff for roughly $500,000 but said the claims were false, court filings show.
According to the former friend, Tyson Wrensch, Garcia and Niroula would show up at bars in San Francisco’s Castro neighborhood and shower patrons with free drinks.
“Everyone knew that the prince was at the bar,” he said. “Everything was over the top.”
Hightower described Garcia as the link to Lambert, who met Garcia through an online dating site in the spring of 2008 and flew him to Palm Springs.
During the meeting with Lambert, Niroula secretly let in two accomplices who fatally stabbed the art dealer and buried him in a shallow grave north of Los Angeles, Hightower said. Two other accomplices, including Replogle, a San Francisco lawyer who’d represented Garcia in the sex abuse suit, also participated in the plot, Hightower said.
After the killing, the group fabricated powers of attorney in Lambert’s name, drained hundreds of thousands of dollars from his bank account and tried to sell his home, Hightower said.
Within months, all six had been arrested in connection with the killing. Four of them, including Garcia, Niroula and Replogle, were charged with murder, conspiracy, grand theft and other crimes. The four pleaded not guilty and were convicted of murder at separate trials in 2011 and 2012. They were sentenced to life without the possibility of parole.
A fifth suspect confessed, cooperated with authorities and pleaded guilty to voluntary manslaughter. A sixth suspect pleaded guilty to fraud.
Convictions overturned
In 2016, Niroula filed a petition seeking a new trial that accused the judge who oversaw the case of bias. The petition included a series of bombshell claims: In off-the-record comments, Riverside County Superior Court Judge David Downing was recorded on Garcia’s courtroom laptop talking with his clerk about Niroula’s HIV-positive status.
According to the petition, when the clerk said the defendant “likes licking envelopes,” Downing responded: “Ewww lord knows where his tongue has been and for that very reason I don’t like to touch or read anything he gives me and I deny everything as I don’t read it. It’s a tough world folks.”
The petition notes another comment in which Downing used an expletive to describe the defendants and said they “can file anything they want, but I won’t grant any important motions.”
During a private meeting, Garcia confronted Downing about the recordings, according to the appeals decision. Downing responded that he was protected by the First Amendment and treated everyone in the case appropriately, the decision shows.
Downing, whose law license has been listed as inactive since 2013, hasn’t commented publicly on the case or responded to messages left at a phone number listed under his name.
In 2020, after the Riverside County District Attorney’s Office said it didn’t oppose new trials for the four defendants who denied the murder charges, a judge overturned the convictions and ordered the cases to be retried.
“I felt probably the way Lambert did when he had the knife shoved into his back,” Lisa DiMaria, the Riverside County prosecutor who tried the case, told “Dateline.” “All of those years that I dedicated to getting justice for Lambert out the window. One of the most upsetting days of my life, the absolute most upsetting day of my career.”
A jailhouse death and more convictions
On Aug. 11, 2022, the first of the defendants to be retried — Replogle — was convicted of all charges. Weeks later, while awaiting retrial, another inmate killed Niroula at the Riverside County jail, according to a wrongful death lawsuit filed by Niroula’s family.
The suit, filed in federal court, accuses the county sheriff’s office of failing to protect Niroula, 41, from harm.
According to the suit, Niroula identified as a transgender woman at the time and was beaten and strangled to death by a person described in the complaint as a violent predator who “posed an immediate threat of violence and harm to all other inmates in his immediate vicinity and especially inmates like Kaushal Niroula.”
The sheriff’s office has denied the allegations, which are set for trial in February.
In 2023, two more convictions followed. But only one of the defendants — a former San Francisco bartender whom prosecutors said Niroula let into Lambert’s house — was sentenced. That November, he was ordered to serve life without the possibility of parole.
Sentencing for Replogle and Garcia was delayed for months, however. In a court filing, Garcia said he hadn’t been provided with accommodations compliant with the Americans with Disabilities Act. Garcia has a rare genetic disorder that causes extreme sensitivity to sunlight, the filing says.
Garcia and Replogle also raised issues about their legal representation. At one point last October, as Replogle sought to have a newly appointed attorney thrown off the case, the judge denied the request and said, “There’s going to be no more playing games.”
Finally sentenced — again
Six months later, on April 25, Riverside County Superior Court Judge Anthony Villalobos denied a motion from Garcia seeking a new trial and sentenced him to life without the possibility of parole. In July, Villalobos denied a request from Replogle for a new trial and sentenced him to the same punishment.
After Garcia’s hearing, DiMaria, the prosecutor, acknowledged the frustration that she felt after having watched the case drag on for years. She described Downing’s comments as “flippant” and said the reversal had nothing to do with the quality of the evidence prosecutors assembled.
“There was never a question about innocence,” she said. “There was never a question about whether or not he did it.”
“The most aggravating part is that he conned and manipulated the system, just like he did with his victims,” DiMaria said of Garcia. “The criminal justice system was played just like all of the victims were.”
Garcia continues to maintain his innocence. In an interview with “Dateline,” he denied playing a role in the killing and blamed Niroula and the other defendants for the murder.