A Riverside jury deliberated for just over a day before returning with unanimous verdicts against Edgar Ivan Gomez Garcia of Mead Valley for the deaths of 29-year-old Junior Rafael Gonzalez and 39-year-old Pedro Cortes Rodriguez in 2019.

Along with the murder counts, jurors found Garcia guilty of sentence- enhancing allegations of using a deadly weapon — a vehicle — in the commission of a felony and fleeing the scene.

Riverside County Superior Court Judge Bernard Schwartz did not immediately set a sentencing date. He ordered Garcia to remain held without bail at the Byrd Detention Center.

In the predawn hours of Oct. 18, 2019, the defendant and his then- friend, identified in court documents only as “Hector,” went to the El Rodeo Club & Restaurant at 24805 Alessandro Blvd., where Hector became inebriated, according to a trial brief filed by the District Attorney’s Office.

He was involved in an unspecified confrontation with a club patron that turned physical, culminating in two security guards hustling him out of the establishment into the parking lot, where the heavily intoxicated man continued to remain belligerent, court papers stated.

The guards deployed pepper spray, and one of them threw a gut punch, causing Hector to keel over in the parking lot, according to the brief. Garcia was walking to his friend’s Ford F-150 pickup truck when he saw what happened, prompting him to challenge the men to a fight but was talked out of it by another employee of the venue, prosecutors said.

Hector was unable to walk unassisted, requiring Garcia to “drag him through the parking lot,” at which point the victims, among a group of friends, “laughed and began to take video of Hector being dragged,” the brief said.

The defendant, inflamed by the group’s behavior, placed his friend in the pickup’s passenger seat and got behind the wheel. A security surveillance camera mounted on a business across the street recorded the ensuing moments after Garcia started the truck.

“The video captured the truck pull out of a parking stall and drive up the parking aisle toward a store next to El Rodeo,” according to the brief. “The truck turned right in front of the store, towards El Rodeo, and rapidly accelerated, screeching its tires. The truck came to an abrupt stop before reaching the front of El Rodeo. After a couple of seconds, the driver accelerated into the crowd. The footage captured the truck striking the victims and dragging their bodies across the asphalt.”

Witnesses dialed 911 as Garcia sped away.

Junior Gonzalez was pronounced dead at the scene. Rodriguez lingered in a coma for nine days at Riverside University Medical Center before he was taken off of life support.

Sheriff’s detectives gathered sufficient evidence from witnesses, as well as the Moreno Valley Citywide Camera System, to identify the pickup and its owner. That led to an interview with Hector several days later, during which he recalled only vague details about the incident, saying he remembered being helped into his pickup and into his son’s bed after arriving home, but virtually nothing else — and Garcia didn’t tell him anything, according to court papers.

He told investigators Garcia had been staying with him, sleeping on his living room couch for weeks, while the two went to work in Brea, but a day after the restaurant deaths, the defendant abruptly left and returned to his mother’s house in Mead Valley.

In a text message on Oct. 20, 2019, Garcia “encouraged Hector to get rid of the truck and to burn it,” the brief said.

Based on the evidence, especially eyewitness identification of Garcia as the driver, a warrant was obtained, and on Oct. 22, 2019, he was arrested without incident in Moreno Valley.

He has no documented prior felony convictions in Riverside County.

The post Jury Convicts MoVal Restaurant Killer Of Murder appeared first on The Hemet & San Jacinto Chronicle.

Jacob Austin Parr, 45, is charged with second-degree murder for the 2022 death of Isaak Quintin Ruiz.

Jurors went behind closed doors after the prosecution and defense delivered closing statements on Dec. 19, and they deliberated part of the day on Dec. 20, when Riverside County Superior Court Judge Timothy Hollenhorst gave them a rest period through Christmas and New Year’s. He directed the panel to return to the Riverside Hall of Justice on Jan. 2.

Parr is being held in lieu of $1 million bail at the Byrd Detention Center.

According to a defense brief filed in April, Parr and Ruiz had been friends for several years, but Parr had only sold narcotics to the victim periodically in the four months prior to his death.

Testimony by sheriff’s investigators during the defendant’s 2023 preliminary hearing indicated Ruiz had attempted to kick his drug habit, trying to detox in a rehabilitation program, but he continued to “struggle with opiates.”

“The decedent’s girlfriend … told police that he struggled with addiction and went from using heroin to fentanyl,” the brief stated. “She said that it was difficult for him to resist smoking whatever substance he had in his possession.”

Court papers said Parr was endeavoring to put his life on track and quit using or selling drugs, but when Ruiz couldn’t find a seller, he turned to the defendant.

“(Ruiz) rejected offers for less lethal opiates and said he would save his money for ‘fetty,”‘ the brief said.

In a text exchange between the victim and defendant in February 2022, Parr warned, “You gotta be careful, bro’. This (expletive) will kill you if you haven’t used in a while,” according to the narrative.

At one point, before allegedly selling fentanyl to Ruiz, the defendant offered him Narcan, an opioid antagonist that can arrest the effects of fentanyl and save victims who have taken a potentially lethal amount, the brief said. Ruiz didn’t accept.

On the night of April 22, 2022, Parr met Ruiz at a Norco restaurant, allegedly selling him an undetermined amount of fentanyl, then the two left in Parr’s car and drove to a nearby 76 Station on Sixth Street, where Ruiz stepped into the men’s room and locked the door, according to investigators.

Parr drove away.

The victim consumed the fentanyl he’d purchased and passed out on the floor. He was in there for two hours before the clerk finally unlocked the door to check on him, discovering him dead, according to investigators.

Detectives ultimately identified Parr as the person who allegedly sold the fentanyl to the victim, culminating in his arrest on July 12, 2022. The defendant has a prior conviction for misdemeanor DUI.

Since February 2021, the District Attorney’s Office has charged over 30 people countywide in connection with fentanyl poisonings.

In November 2023, prosecutors closed the books on the county’s first fentanyl murder case to go before a jury, culminating in the conviction of 34- year-old Vicente David Romero, who was sentenced to 15 years to life in prison for the 2020 death of a Temecula woman.

Public health statistics show there were 550 known fentanyl-related fatalities countywide in 2023, a 9% increase from 2022, when there were 503. Data from 2024 hasn’t been published.

Fentanyl is manufactured in overseas labs, principally in China, according to the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, which says the drug is smuggled across the U.S.-Mexico border by cartels. It’s 80 to 100 times more potent than morphine and can be mixed into any number of street narcotics and prescription drugs, without a user knowing what he or she is consuming. Ingestion of only two milligrams can be fatal.

Fentanyl is the leading cause of death for Americans between 18 and 45 years old.

The post Jury Deliberations In RivCo Deadly Fentanyl Trial Continue appeared first on The Hemet & San Jacinto Chronicle.

Jeremiah David Carlton, 21, of Canyon Lake is accused in the death of the teenager, identified in court documents only as “J.G.”

Carlton is charged with second-degree murder, transportation of controlled substances for sale and possession of controlled substances for sale.

During a pretrial hearing Tuesday at the Southwest Justice Center in Murrieta, Riverside County Superior Court Judge John Monterosso conferred with the prosecution and defense regarding a specific date for the next stage of proceedings, and both sides indicated they would be prepared to move forward at the end of next month.

Carlton is being held in lieu of $1 million bail at the Byrd Detention Center.

His co-defendant, 21-year-old Raymond Gene Tyrrell of French Valley, who was charged separately, pleaded guilty in July to voluntary manslaughter and was sentenced to three years in state prison. However, due to the amount of time he’d already spent in jail awaiting disposition of the case, along with other sentencing credits, Judge Stephen Gallon converted his prison term to what’s known as a “paper commitment,” enabling Tyrrell to instantly go on parole.

Sgt. Rick Espinoza of the Riverside County Sheriff’s Department alleged that Carlton and Tyrrell provided the drugs that led to the death of J.G. on the night of Feb. 24, 2021, at a residence in the 35000 block of Sugar Maple Street, near Leon Road.

Espinoza said deputies were called to the location to investigate two possible fentanyl poisonings and discovered the girl and a man, whose identity was not released, comatose. Both were taken to a regional trauma center, where the man was revived but the girl succumbed to the toxic ingestion.

“Detectives conducted an investigation and developed information that this was possibly a homicide,” the sergeant said, declining to elaborate on the circumstances.

Tyrrell was summoned to the sheriff’s Southwest station in Murrieta a day later and interviewed by detectives, after which he was taken into custody. Carlton was served with an arrest warrant and taken into custody at his residence.

Neither defendant had documented prior felony convictions.

Since February 2021, the District Attorney’s Office has charged over 30 people countywide in connection with fentanyl poisonings.

In November, prosecutors closed the books on the county’s first fentanyl murder case to go before a jury, culminating in the conviction of 34- year-old Vicente David Romero, who was sentenced to 15 years to life in prison for the 2020 death of a Temecula woman. District Attorney Mike Hestrin said it was the first fentanyl murder conviction in the state.

According to public health statistics, there were 550 known fentanyl- related fatalities countywide in 2023, a 9% increase from 2022, when there were 503.

Fentanyl is manufactured in overseas labs, principally in China, according to the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, which says the synthetic opioid is smuggled across the U.S.-Mexico border by cartels.

Fentanyl is 80-100 times more potent than morphine and can be mixed into any number of street narcotics and prescription drugs, without a user knowing what he or she is consuming. Ingestion of only two milligrams can be fatal.

Fentanyl is the leading cause of death for Americans between 18 and 45 years old.

The post Trial Date Set For Canyon Lake Man Accused In Girl’s Fentanyl Death appeared first on The Hemet & San Jacinto Chronicle.

INDIO (CNS) – A judge is scheduled to decide today whether a Murrieta
man charged with second-degree murder and drunken driving in a fatal Palm
Springs crash will have to stand trial.
   Michael Torrez, 33, is accused of having a .16 blood-alcohol content — double the legal limit — when he crashed into two cars on March 16, 2018, one of which was driven by 25-year-old Palm Springs resident Mario Garcia, who died at the scene. Torrez is scheduled to appear for a preliminary hearing this morning at the Larson Justice Center in Indio.
   Torrez was charged in April 2018 with second-degree murder rather than vehicular manslaughter due to a 2008 DUI conviction. Drivers with DUI convictions are warned at sentencing that if they drive under the influence and cause a death, they could face a murder charge.
   The 11 p.m. crash began with Torrez allegedly heading westbound on Ramon Road in a pickup truck, “swerving in and out of the lanes at a high rate of speed,” an arrest warrant declaration alleges.
   While passing El Cielo Road, Torrez’s Ford F-150 rear-ended a Nissan Versa, then veered into a Nissan Sentra driven by Garcia. The Versa was sent into a curb and street sign after being struck, but its occupants were uninjured, according to Palm Springs police.
   Investigators allege that Torrez had to be sedated and restrained as he was being transported to Desert Regional Medical Center for major injuries sustained in the crash.
   He “yelled profanities at emergency personnel and he flailed his arms and attempted to free himself from restraints that were applied to him,” according to the declaration, which states that Torrez told a responding firefighter, “When I get done, I am going to (expletive) you up!”
   He also allegedly yelled, “I better not get a (expletive) DUI!”
   Torrez remains held in lieu of $1 million bail at the Cois M. Byrd Detention Center near Murrieta, according to county jail records.

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The post Judge To Decide If Man Accused Of DUI Murder Will Stand Trial appeared first on The Hemet & San Jacinto Chronicle.