SANTA PAULA : Suspect in Shooting Death to Stand Trial
A Ventura County judge Tuesday ordered a 24-year-old Santa Paula man to stand trial after hearing tearful testimony from a woman who described how her husband identified the man who shot him five times before he died.
The ruling was made by Municipal Judge Bruce A. Clark, who set an arraignment March 29 for Jose Luis Gonzalez before Superior Court Judge Lawrence Storch.
Last month, Storch ruled Gonzalez competent to stand trial despite the testimony of two psychiatrists who concluded that the defendant is a paranoid schizophrenic who believes that he is a “special person.” One doctor, Patrick C. Barker of Patton State Hospital, testified that Gonzalez believes that he is being transformed into slain former Beatle John Lennon.
At Tuesday’s preliminary hearing, Grace De La Cruz said that shortly before her husband was killed at their Santa Paula home, she heard him struggling with someone who was trying to force his way into the family’s back kitchen door.
De La Cruz said she then heard the sound of breaking glass, followed by five blasts from a shotgun.
She found her husband slumped against a wall, she testified. After her husband lost consciousness, she testified that the assailant again tried to force open the kitchen door.
“I yelled, ‘Jose Luis! Jose Luis! Please go away. You have already killed him,’ ” De La Cruz said, speaking through an interpreter.
Gonzalez displayed little emotion throughout the hearing.
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