(Aramazd Andressian, Sr. seen in court August 1. Photo by Al Seib/Los Angeles Times/Court Pool)
A father from South Pasadena who admitted murdering his son after visiting Disneyland will be sentenced to 25-years-to-life in prison Wednesday morning.
Aramazd Andressian, Sr. pleaded guilty August 1 to killing 5-year-old Aramazd Andressian, Jr., known as "Piqui."
Andressian, Sr. may address the court before the sentence is imposed, and the boy's mother and her family were also expected to speak at the hearing.
L.A. County Sheriff's Department homicide detectives said the murder happened in the early morning hours of April 21, and Andressian then left his son's body near Lake Cachuma in Santa Barbara County.
The father was found unconscious in a park in South Pasadena the next morning, the day the boy was to be returned to his mother after a court-arranged visit.
Andressian' defense lawyer said his client intended to plead guilty as soon as the criminal case was filed.
"There's no [plea] bargain here," attorney Ambrosio Rodriguez told reporters earlier this month.
"My client wanted to plead guilty and take responsibility for what he did," he said.
"He acted alone," he added, but declined to offer any details of how or why Andressian murdered the boy. "This was not planned."
The criminal complaint alleged the killing was premeditated and L.A. County Deputy District Attorney Craig Hum said had the case gone to trial, he would have proved Andressian planned the murder.
"It's our position the evidence supports the fact that it was planned, it was premeditated, it was deliberate," Hum said.
"He had this in mind before he actually committed the murder," he said.
Andressian, Sr. and the boy's mother were in the midst of a heated custody dispute, in which the father falsely accused the mother of child abuse in an attempt to gain an advantage in family court, according to documents filed in that case.