Ultimately, he was convicted and sentenced to death in 1983 and was subsequently executed in 1999 at San Quentin State Prison by lethal injection.

[5] Following his release from prison for good behavior, he trained as a monk at a Buddhist monastery and then got a job as a cook on a cargo ship.

He later aided U.S. drug authorities in a sting operation and acquired the money that allowed him to buy passage to the United States.

[6] On December 15, 1981, the bodies of 36-year-old Packovan Wattanaporn and 52-year-old Quach Nguyen were found in the storeroom of a retail store in Garden Grove, California.

Wattanaporn, the store manager, had been strangled, while Nguyen, an employee, had suffered multiple stab wounds to the head and neck.

In December 1995, a federal judge conducted an eight-day hearing and found no evidence that supported the idea of Siripongs having an accomplice.

[9] Multiple groups of people tried to appeal the execution, including Pope John Paul II, the husband of Wattanaporn, who was a Buddhist, two of the jurors at his trial, and the former warden of San Quentin State Prison, who, despite attempting to spare Siripongs life, was a supporter of capital punishment.