Santa Rosa transient gets life in prison in fatal stabbing

A homeless Santa Rosa man was sentenced to life in prison Friday for stabbing another man to death outside the downtown library on Christmas Eve after becoming enraged when the victim asked him for a cigarette.

Vladimir Sotelo-Urena, 26, showed no emotion as Judge Rene Chouteau handed down the punishment for the slaying of Nicholas Bloom, 22, also of Santa Rosa, who also was homeless.

A jury this fall found him guilty of first-degree murder.

Bloom’s father and stepmother appeared to forgive their son’s killer in tearful speeches in which they urged him to find God as he serves his sentence.

“Jesus Christ died for you so you could be forgiven for your sins,” Robert Bloom said. “I hope you find strength to find the Lord while you’re in prison.”

But the victim’s aunt said she couldn’t excuse the killing of her nephew, a Montgomery High School graduate. Becky Glass said she’s awakened by nightmares of Bloom running for his life from Sotelo-Urena, who plunged a kitchen knife into his body as many as 80 times.

“What you did was unconscionable,” Glass said to Sotelo-Urena, who sat at the defense table looking straight ahead.

As she spoke, people in the court gallery, many wearing T-shirts emblazoned with Bloom’s picture, wept . Jail inmates waiting for their own cases to be called wiped at their eyes.

Prosecutor Bob Waner played a short video set to country music showing Bloom as a child and young adult.

Afterward, the judge rebuked ?Sotelo-Urena, who could be eligible for parole in 26 years, for his extreme violence.

“The life sentence you’re about to receive certainly is appropriate,” Chouteau said before concluding the hearing.

Neither Sotelo-Urena nor his lawyer, Nathan Poulos, spoke.

At trial, they suggested Sotelo-Urena acted in self-defense when Bloom approached him in a threatening manner. Sotelo-Urena told police he thought Bloom was reaching for a weapon.

And tests showed Bloom had high levels of methamphetamine in this blood.

But Bloom was unarmed. Police found a tube of lip balm and a $20 bill in his outstretched arm. Other bills and his wallet were found on the ground nearby.

Waner told jurors Bloom may have been trying to offer Sotelo- Urena money to stop attacking him.

The prosecutor said Sotelo- Urena appeared to be driven by a mistaken belief that Bloom was among a group of men who attacked him earlier.

He responded with an unreasonable level of force given that Bloom was moving away from him at the time.

He was so angry that he kicked Bloom in the head after he fell to the ground, mortally wounded.

“There is nothing reasonable about this killing,” Waner said in his closing argument.

You can reach Staff Writer Paul Payne at 568-5312 or paul.payne@pressdemocrat.com. ?On Twitter @ppayne.