A state appeals court panel Friday upheld the convictions of three men in connection with a 13-year-old Whittier girl’s murder more than two decades ago.

The three-justice panel from California’s 2nd District Court of Appeal noted that Santos Grimaldi, Melvin Sandoval and Rogelio Contreras raised a “plethora of challenges to either their convictions or sentences,” but found that “their substantive challenges lack merit.”

Grimaldi, now 42, and Sandoval, now 46, were convicted of first-degree murder for the June 2001 killing of Jacqueline Piazza and are serving life in prison without the possibility of parole.

Jurors also found true the special circumstance allegations of murder during the commission of a rape and a lewd act on a child against the two, along with gang and gun allegations.

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