Joshua Rodriguez and Victoria Dennis
San Antonio death penalty case ends in mistrial over attorney’s health
By Elizabeth Zavala
San Antonio Express-News
A lawyer’s injury prompted a judge Thursday to declare a mistrial in what would have been the first capital murder case tried in San Antonio since 2015, when a man got death for killing a Bexar County sheriff’s sergeant.
Brian Flores was 33 and already in jail on two other charges when he was arrested and charged with capital murder-multiple persons in the deaths of Joshua Rodriguez, 18, and Victoria Dennis, 17. The homicides occurred at the Churchill Park apartments complex in the 1200 block of Patricia Drive on Sept. 29, 2015.
The teens allegedly were killed over a sex tape that involved Rodriguez and a female not identified in an arrest warrant affidavit released at the time. Reports indicate that Rodriguez was threatened over social media involving a photograph of him and another woman. That woman told authorities that her boyfriend might have asked Flores to intervene.
Prosecutors Jason Goss and Gretchen Flader began jury selection weeks ago with Flores’ attorneys, Ed Camara and David Woodard. However, Camara recently suffered a concussion after he fell and hit his head June 18, which delayed proceedings. His doctor, Burton Shaw, said he examined Camara, 77, on Monday and that he has post-concussion syndrome, can’t walk a straight line, and “is a little slower and muted in his responses.”
In a hearing Thursday, Goss and Woodard argued before Visiting Judge Susan Reed, who is presiding over the case, about Camara’s competency since the injury. Each questioned Shaw on Camara’s health and whether he could continue seating a jury, which, in a death penalty case, can take up to a month, as compared to one day to seat a panel for other cases.
“I think you’d have difficulty making the case that he’s competent,” Shaw said under direct questioning by Goss. “Sometimes (recovery time for concussions) can be a matter of weeks, sometimes months. Most people, three months.”
Shaw did say he felt that Camara could do “office work” and sit at a desk, and he agreed with Goss that he likely could continue picking a jury. But Woodard contended that the doctor had no idea what goes into jury selection.
Goss asserted that Flores’ attorneys were attempting to drag out the case with continuances.
“He wants a continuance that takes us into the next (district attorney) administration,” Goss told Reed. “Even with this break, we still can seat a jury in August. We can finish it (the trial) before September. As the doctor testified, this is a bump on the head.”
Goss also stressed that the state had subopoenaed more than 100 witnesses and that if proceedings halted, they would have to find them all over again.
Woodard countered that the court should grant a mistrial because there’s no telling when Camara will be ready.
“This is a 77-year-old man with a concussion. We’re not talking about a small child or a teen,” Woodard said.
He also accused the state of rushing to put Flores, now 36, to death and without the attorney requirements for defendants facing execution.
Texas law holds lawyers representing capital murder defendants to a higher standard and gives specific experience requirements for first- and second-chair attorneys.
“We need to take our time,” Woodard said. “He (Flores) only has one attorney.”
Reed acknowledged that four jurors already had been seated but said she would order them to be released.
“If we want to call it a mistrial, that’ll be what it’s called. Mr. Camara is removed, another (attorney) will be appointed,” she said.
Reed was expected to set a hearing for a later date.
Flores’ case would have been the first death penalty case in Bexar County since 2015, when a jury sent Mark Anthony Gonzalez to death row for killing Sgt. Kenneth Vann. On May 28, 2011, Vann was shot 26 times and nearly decapitated while he sat at a stoplight in Southeast Bexar County.
https://www.expressnews.com/news/loc...l-13052128.php
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