Murder Counts Filed in Fatal Temecula Crash

Prosecutors filed murder charges Thursday against a youth suspected of driving a stolen vehicle full of illegal immigrants that struck and killed five people in front of a Temecula high school while fleeing a Border Patrol car.

The youth, thought to be a smuggler of illegal immigrants and believed to be from Mexico, will be arraigned on five counts of murder in Riverside County Juvenile Court today. Investigators are still trying to verify his assertion that he is 16 years old and may seek to charge him as an adult, authorities said.

INS Commissioner Gene McNary announced Thursday that he has dispatched a recently appointed head of internal affairs to investigate the accident. McNary also will meet next week with two Republican congressmen who have demanded that he justify the value of the Temecula immigration checkpoint where Tuesday’s chase began, as well as a busier freeway checkpoint near San Clemente.

One of the congressmen, Rep. Ron Packard (R-Oceanside), said Thursday the crash has become a “watershed” that brings to a head the often controversial history of the freeway checkpoints and the chases and fatal accidents they have generated. The Border Patrol must prove why the checkpoints should not be eliminated, Packard said.

“Eliminating the checkpoints would eliminate the problems,” said Packard, usually a strong supporter of the INS. “A lot of people in the cities south of the checkpoints are annoyed at having to stop, slow down or be checked. They feel it’s un-American. They feel they shouldn’t be victims of the problem of illegal aliens. . . . Five lives have been lost, five innocent lives.”

Meanwhile, investigators have had trouble determining the identities of the 12 illegal immigrants who were passengers in the stolen Chevrolet Suburban involved in Tuesday’s accident because many did not have identification or gave false names, said Supervising Deputy Dist. Atty. Craig Datig.

Five of the passengers remain hospitalized. A man in very critical condition at Riverside General Hospital has been tentatively identified as Enciforo Vargas Gomez, 21.

Investigators for the Riverside County Sheriff and the INS reviewed further possible criminal charges against the alleged driver and the other men.

McNary sent his director of internal investigations, Jack Chase, to California to head an inquiry. Chase will also probably join in a review of Border Patrol pursuit policies that had already begun before the Temecula accident, officials said.

“By sending my special designate to California to conduct an inquiry, we hope to learn exactly what happened and determine if any actions can be taken to ensure that such a tragedy never recurs,” McNary said. “On behalf of the entire INS, I express my condolences to the community and all of those who lost friends and loved ones in the accident.”

But friends of one of the victims’ families say they want to compel the formation of a citizen review board to monitor the activities of the INS and the Border Patrol.

“If they’re going to infiltrate our city and endanger our citizens, our children, then we have the right to monitor that,” said Elia Esparza, publisher of El Remate, a Spanish-language shopper in Temecula.

One of Esparza’s employees--and a cousin--is Gloria Murillo, who lost two of her four children in the crash. Jose and Gloria Murillo were walking to Temecula Valley High School Tuesday morning when the fleeing truck crashed through the intersection. The truck struck and killed them after shearing in half a car carrying the other victims--John Davis, 46, his son, Todd Davis, 17, and a family friend, Monisa Emilio, 14.

The elder Murillo went to the scene to cover the crash for her newspaper--only to discover that her 16-year-old son and 17-year-old daughter were among the victims.

Davis’ widow blames the Border Patrol for the deaths of her husband and son, a family spokesman said.

Dan Gould said Linda Davis’ mourning is turning to anger toward the Border Patrol’s chase policies. “That’s the bottom line: when will these chases end?” he said.

Border Patrol officials have maintained that the pursuing agents acted properly and attempted to curtail the chase by slowing down shortly before the crash several miles northeast of the Interstate 15 freeway checkpoint, officials said.

Although the INS does not have precise statistics, at least 25 people have died in chase-related accidents involving the agency around California since 1980.

Times staff writer Tom Gorman in Temecula contributed to this story.