MURRIETA - The mastermind of a $1.5 million heist at the Soboba Casino was convicted today of robbery, false imprisonment and battery charges but acquitted of kidnapping counts that could have brought a life prison term.

The eight-man, four-woman jury deliberated less than a full day before finding Rolando Ramos, a former surveillance technician at the casino, guilty of nine counts of robbery, three counts of false imprisonment and one burglary charge.

Jurors also found true an allegation that the 27-year-old defendant stole more than $1.3 million and unlawfully used tear gas on an employee.

Acquittal on the kidnapping charges means there will be no life sentence meted out to Ramos, though he is still looking at substantial prison time, according to his attorney, Richard Briones-Colman.

A separate jury this afternoon began deliberating the fate of co-defendant Eric Aguilera, a 24-year-old former security guard at the casino who allegedly acted as the getaway driver.

The Aug. 2, 2007, heist was the largest-ever casino robbery in Riverside County, according to prosecutor Lori Ronce.

Ramos went to a surveillance trailer to put employees out of operation and keep them from tipping off authorities, then moved on to the casino vault and robbed it using a plastic gun, according to testimony.

The robbery was caught on videotape. The alleged kidnappings were not, leaving it up to prosecutors to prove that moving people from one room to another constituted kidnapping.

In his closing argument on Tuesday, defense attorney Richard Briones-Colman urged the jury to find for the lesser offense of false imprisonment, arguing his client did not take the surveillance employees out of the building but put them in a room away from cameras and radios.

"That movement did not increase the risk," Briones-Colman said.

"That's crazy. This is one building. The door was open. Tying somebody up with duct tape is false imprisonment."

Briones-Colman called his client "goofy" and said he was just this "weird" person who kissed one of "cinematic moment."

Ronce told jurors that Ramos' night of crime "doesn't start with the robbery of the vault." She said he herded three employees in the surveillance unit into part of the trailer where they could not see the monitors and bound them with duct tape.

One employee lured to another room on the pretext of having a private talk with Ramos was pepper-sprayed, according to testimony. The other man and woman in the trailer were bound together back-to-back and then fastened to a pole.

Aguilera, who worked at the casino as a security guard and later as a surveillance technician, allegedly got about $500,000 for being the getaway driver.

Sonya Boyorquez, who has two children with Aguilera, testified that she saw "stacks of money" on a bed when she went to a Palm Springs motel to meet with Ramos and Aguilera.

They they all drove to San Bernardino, where she helped Ramos check into another motel, Boyorquez testified.

She pleaded guilty to being an accessory to the crime and was sentenced to six months of jail time on weekends and placed on probation.

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