Retarded Man’s Good Samaritan Repaid in Scholarship, Honors

When Manuel Beltran spotted a confused Eric Schimmel pacing in circles outside a Fillmore market in September, his first instinct was to lend a hand.

Beltran, 23, had a history of helping down-and-outers, taking them home for a hot meal or giving them an old coat to ward off the night’s chill.

But he wasn’t prepared for the reaction that his act of kindness would bring to the 19-year-old Schimmel--or himself.

Since the incident, Beltran has been recognized by the city of Fillmore, the Ventura County Board of Supervisors and the Optimists Club.

Earlier this month, the Assn. of Retarded Citizens of Ventura County presented Beltran with a $1,000 scholarship, citing his “selflessness, altruism and caring spirit.”

In September, Beltran had no way of knowing that the retarded teen-ager had been released from Ventura County Jail to await trial on suspicion of petty theft and had walked 20 miles in an effort to return to his worried family in Frazier Park.

In all likelihood, it wouldn’t have made a difference.

“I had a sense he was looking for somebody or needed something,” Beltran said of Schimmel. “When I talked to him, he would look at me, and then look away to the highway.”

Twice, Beltran took Schimmel home, where he offered to feed him and call social agencies for help.

But the withdrawn Schimmel turned down the meals and asked to return to the market where Beltran found him. The second time, Beltran stuffed $10 and his telephone number in Schimmel’s pocket before driving him back.

Sheriff’s deputies finally found Schimmel when they responded to a complaint that he was loitering, and found him talking to Beltran. They returned Schimmel, who had been released from jail four days earlier, to his distraught parents.

Prosecutors dropped charges against Schimmel after his return home. Today, he remains with his family awaiting entry into a vocational program, said his mother, Linda Smith, who earlier said she was grateful for Beltran’s act of friendship.

“I think he almost saved his life,” Smith said. “I don’t know what would have happened if no one had helped him and kept and eye on him and just let him go his way.”

News of Beltran’s kindness brought the Fillmore High graduate a flood of attention.

The scholarship more than doubled the money that Beltran had saved for his education. Having attended Ventura College for two years, Beltran hopes to return to school to become an emergency medical technician. Later, he said, he hopes to join a seminary and be ordained a priest.

Beltran’s charity came as no surprise to Ernie Morales, an administrator at Fillmore’s St. Francis of Assisi Catholic Church, where Beltran is active.

“He’s always asking if it’s all right to bring someone home to help them out,” said Morales, who has provided a home to Beltran and his younger brother, Juan, for the past five years.

“He was never expecting anything from it--he was just being Manny,” Morales said. “It’s just his nature.”

Beltran credits his generosity to his religious faith, which he acquired growing up with his grandparents in the small town of Teocaltiche, Mexico, 75 miles from Guadalajara.

Born in Ventura, Beltran only saw his parents several times during his childhood, and his grandparents were not particularly observant of their Catholic faith, Beltran said.

But Beltran had a great curiosity about the meaning of religion and a rebellious attitude toward the customs. “I wanted to know why I couldn’t see the priest’s face when I went to confession, and I wanted to know why you couldn’t worship God without all this mystery,” Beltran said.

After returning to Ventura County to stay with his godparents while attending Fillmore High, Beltran delved into the activities of the church, and for two years attended the novitiate of the Missionaries of the Holy Spirit in Long Beach.

A lay minister at St. Francis and the president of the Spanish-Speaking Young Adults for Ventura and Santa Barbara counties, Beltran said he enjoys looking after the spiritual welfare of sick parishioners at home or in the hospital.

But Beltran admitted that he was dumbfounded by the attention that his offer to help Schimmel has brought. “I acted like a block of wood, and my mind was blank” during the scholarship presentation, Beltran said.

More than the money, he said, letters from the public that he received after the incident touched him. “One person wrote that he had regained his faith in people,” Beltran said.

“That is a reward to me in itself.”