BAKERSFIELD, Calif. (KGET) — A man who pleaded guilty to gunning down two men at an Arvin bar nine years ago was sentenced Wednesday to 69 years to life in prison.

Juan Pablo Vega, 41, shot and killed Jorge Zavala and Federico Moreno at El Potrero Night Club the evening of June 8, 2015. A third man was shot but survived.

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Before the sentence was imposed, Zavala’s widow, Liliana Martinez, implored Judge Kenneth C. Twisselman II to make sure Vega is never released.

“I would really appreciate if this man would never walk the streets my children will be walking the rest of their life,” Martinez said.

She also addressed Vega directly, saying she hopes he grows a conscience and his actions trouble him.

“You’re not human,” she said. “You’re a monster.”

A Spanish-language interpreter read two letters Vega wrote ahead of the hearing.

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Vega claimed he never meant to hurt anyone, and apologized to both families. He wrote his family is suffering too, and his actions have embarrassed them.

Vega wrote he doesn’t expect forgiveness.

“I accept the responsibility for my actions,” he wrote.

Prosecutors said Vega’s girlfriend, Lourdes Olvera, instigated the shooting. They said she urged Vega to come to the club and shoot men who were bothering her.

Vega fled the bar and was arrested months later after he was pulled over by U.S. Marshals and California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation personnel on Highway 58 near Cottonwood Road.

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There were multiple postponements in Vega’s case, some caused by the pandemic. He pleaded guilty in February.

After her 2016 murder trial ended in a hung jury, Olvera pleaded guilty to two counts of soliciting a murder and a charge of threatening a witness and was sentenced to 12 years in prison. She has since been released.

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