Crime & Safety

Walnut Creek Man Gets 15 Years for Knifing Estranged Wife's Suitor

Robert Hoselton apologizes in court for killing Manuel Gwin of Pleasant Hill.

A Walnut Creek man received a 15-year prison sentence Friday for knifing his estranged wife's former suitor on the day he learned she planned to leave him and seek custody of their children.

Robert Hoselton, 40, pleaded no contest to a charge of voluntary manslaughter with use of a knife in the killing of Manuel Gwin Jr., a local realtor and Pleasant Hill native who Hoselton believed had seen his wife on that day.

Hoselton's ex-wife Veronica had dated Gwin prior to her marriage to him in 2006 and had rekindled the relationship when she and Hoselton began having marital troubles in 2009.

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Hoselton, a pipe-fitter, was accused of killing Gwin and setting fire to the house he once shared with his wife on June 18, 2009. He had been ordered out of the home after he was found guilty of battering his wife there.

On the day of the killing, Hoselton learned his wife was leaving him and went out looking for her, finding her car around the corner from Gwin's home in Pleasant Hill. Investigators say the chain of events that unfolded were sparked by Hoselton's mistaken impression that his wife was with Gwin, when in actuality she was meeting an herbalist who lived in Gwin's neighborhood.

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Police say Hoselton went to Gwin's home, confronted and killed him on his doorstep when Gwin came to the door. Hoselton searched the house for his wife and, unable to find her, returned to their home and set it on fire - cutting his own throat in an aborted attempt at suicide.

Hoselton apologized to Gwin's family members during an emotional sentencing hearing Friday and said that Gwin "did not deserve to die."


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