SAN FRANCISCO -- The lawyer of a 21-year-old from El Salvador accused of gunning down a man and his two sons at a San Francisco intersection disputed claims that his client escaped deportation after committing other violent crimes because of the city’s controversial sanctuary policy.

Defense attorney Robert Amparan asked Judge Lucy McCabe to once again delay a plea to triple homicide charges for his client – Edwin Ramos. He is facing the possibility of life without parole or the death penalty, if convicted.

Amparan also asked the judge that a gag order be placed on the proceeding after a weekend story in the San Francisco Chronicle claimed that Ramos was an illegal immigrant and a gang member who had escaped deportation after he committed two violent crimes as a juvenile because of San Francisco’s controversial shelter law.

Mayor Gavin Newsom rescinded that policy earlier this month but only after an investigative report by the Chronicle found that several violent juvenile offenders had been allowed to remain in the country because of the law.

Outside the courtroom, Amparan called the murders "a horrible incident, but he's not responsible," he said of Ramos. "He's not a gang member." He claimed Ramos has actually been involved in "gang abatement" efforts in the community.

"False information is being placed out there," Amparan said to reporters outside the courtroom today, singling out the recent disclosure of Ramos' alleged felony juvenile record. "The people that know him know that he would never become involved in something like this,"

The newspaper report triggered outrage from the family of the three men slain in the shooting.

“This could have been avoided,” said Frank Kennedy, who is married to the slain father’s sister.” Here he is living in El Sobrante, but he going into San Francisco to commit violent crimes because he can get away with it.”

Anthony Bologna and his sons Michael, 20, and Matthew, 16, were found shot inside their car just after 3 p.m. near the intersection of Maynard and Congdon streets, according to police.

Anthony and Michael Bologna were pronounced dead at the scene. Matthew Bologna was rushed to San Francisco General Hospital, but was removed from life support Tuesday, police reported.

Days later, Ramos was arrested in his El Sobrante home.

Ramos works at an auto supply store, is married and has a baby. But investigators say he is also a member of MS-13, a Latino street gang. They found knives, a machete and pistol at his home, but not the murder weapon.

His attorney says Ramos is not the gunman.

"I feel comfortable he is never going to be convicted of this shooting. The act seems so inconsistent with his demeanor, his past, the way he comports himself and what he told me," explained lawyer Joe O'Sullivan.

But when asked whether Ramos was in the car at the time of the shooting, O’Sullivan’s answer was less definitive: "I don't know if he was there and I don't know if police can prove he was there."

District Attorney Kamala Harris said Ramos has been charged with three counts of murder, one count of attempted murder, an allegation that the murders were committed as gang activity, an allegation that the crime involved the use of a firearm and two special circumstance allegations for multiple murders and for a murder committed as gang activity.

"This is a horrific tragedy most painfully felt by the family and friends of these innocent victims and shared by our entire city," said Harris. Heartbroken wife and mother Danielle Bologna held her son Matthew’s sweater close while talking with KTVU.

"I don't think anyone should have to go through what I'm going through. You might be able to bury one [family member], but I'm burying three. Those men were my life," Bologna lamented

The case has drawn widespread publicity and could become politically controversial. District Attorney Kamala Harris is opposed to capital punishment.

Danielle Bologna wants whoever is responsible to face the death penalty.

"Why should he be alive and breathing when my husband and my sons Michael and Matthew were taken away? He shouldn't have the right to breath. Honest to God, I never used to think like that until this happened to my family," said Bologna