‘I Didn’t Want to Kill’ Actor, Youth Testifies

A 17-year-old Mexican youth Wednesday evoked God as a witness and said that he did not mean to kill actor David Oliver Huffman, who was stabbed to death with a screwdriver while trying to apprehend the youth who had burglarized a motor home in Balboa Park.

Speaking through an interpreter, Genaro Villanueva told the jury in Spanish that he never intended to hurt Huffman. “I didn’t have any intentions of hurting him. God is a witness that I didn’t want to kill him,” Villanueva said.

Both sides rested their cases Wednesday, and the jury is expected to begin deliberating today after receiving instructions from Superior Court Judge Norbert Ehrenfreund. The boy is charged with murder, burglary, attempted burglary and interfering with a police officer.

Villanueva, who appeared as the only defense witness, said that Huffman chased him into a Balboa Park canyon after the actor came to the aid of a Canadian couple who caught the teen-ager burglarizing their motor home on Feb. 27. The youth said that Huffman yanked him off a fence and a lengthy struggle ensued, and that he responded violently because he was threatened by Huffman’s size and strength.

“Suddenly, I was afraid because that person was stronger than I am. I was afraid he would kill me or he would do something to me. I took the screwdriver out . . . I took it out of my pants pockets . . . and I stabbed him,” Villanueva said.

The youth, who is in the United States illegally, testified that he had been here only a few months at the time of the incident and does not understand English. During the struggle, Huffman was talking to him in English, but he understood when the actor said he was going to turn him over to the police, Villanueva said.

“I didn’t want to be arrested . . . we started to fight,” Villanueva said during questioning by his attorney, public defender Allan Williams.

During cross-examination by Deputy Dist. Atty. Harry Elias, Villanueva admitted that he was afraid of being arrested because earlier in the day police had arrested him for breaking into a van parked near his home. In the earlier incident, a group of citizens chased him around the block to the front of a state Department of Corrections office at 1608 India St., where he was caught and handcuffed by two state parole agents.

An officer took Villanueva to police headquarters, where he was photographed, questioned and fingerprinted. The police then drove him to San Diego High School, where he was handed over to school officials. But instead of going to class, Villanueva said, he left the campus after picking up a screwdriver that he had hidden in a bush on the school grounds.

Villanueva told Elias that he walked to Balboa Park, where he saw the motor home and attempted to steal a television set that was inside. However, he was caught in the act by the owners and fled the scene, with Huffman in pursuit.

While being questioned by Williams, Villanueva said that before the stabbing he and a friend had smoked marijuana and drank vodka in a parked car in front of the high school. However, he could not remember the friend’s name.

During cross-examination, Elias got Villanueva to admit that, despite drinking the vodka and smoking marijuana, he was aware that car burglary is a crime. Elias also got the boy to admit that he told police a different story about the marijuana and vodka. According to a police report, Villanueva said that he had given an unidentified man $15 to buy him a bottle of vodka. A police detective said in the report that Villanueva told police that he went to Balboa Park to smoke the marijuana and drink.

When Elias asked him about the statement he gave to police, Villanueva said he could not remember his conversation with the detective, but he said, “I told him some things that weren’t true.”