Suspect in Slaying of Student Being Released

A 25-year-old man arrested in connection with the stabbing death of Cal State Fullerton honor student Cathy Torrez was expected to be released late Thursday after prosecutors said there was insufficient evidence to file charges against him.

The Anaheim man was booked early Wednesday into Central Men’s Jail on suspicion of murdering Torrez, 20, who disappeared on her way home from work Feb. 12, 1994. Her body was found stuffed inside the trunk of her car seven days later.

But in a move that angered police and Torrez’s family, prosecutors who reviewed the latest evidence decided it fell short.

Deputy Dist. Atty. Rick King refused to discuss what evidence was lacking but said the decision not to file charges “should in no way suggest” the case is closed or that charges won’t be filed eventually.

“It would be a miscarriage of justice and devastating to the surviving family members if we were to file a case prematurely that resulted in the acquittal of a guilty person or the filing of murder charges against the wrong person,” King said.

But the victim’s mother, Mary Bennett, said she wants an explanation as to why charges were not filed.

“I believe I have a right to an explanation,” she said late Thursday, shortly after learning of the suspect’s release.

Matt Reynolds, a Placentia Police Department spokesman, said new leads from old evidence, along with an interview with the suspect on Wednesday, convinced investigators it was “time to move forward” with an arrest.

He would not elaborate on the evidence, other than to say members of an Orange County Sheriff’s Department task force used new technology to reexamine 3-year-old clues.

Detectives were optimistic about the case when they arrived at the afternoon meeting with prosecutors and were disappointed by the suspect’s release, Reynolds said.

They also acknowledged that this latest incident raises questions about the likelihood of Torrez’s killer ever being brought to justice.

“I feel, and we all felt, that this arrest was appropriate at the time,” he said. “I also think we’ve hit a roadblock that we have to hurdle.”

The latest arrest is the second time police have named a suspect in the case while failing to gather enough evidence to implicate him. Torrez’s boyfriend, Sam Lopez, was detained and questioned after her body was found but was never arrested.

Lopez, now a 27-year-old cabinetmaker, had dated Torrez off and on while they attended Valencia High School in Placentia, and the two had considered eloping shortly before Torrez was killed, relatives said.

Police would not elaborate on a possible motive or say why they focused their investigation on the latest suspect, other than to say the shift occurred within the last month.

“This case has never been put away,” Reynolds said. “I think about it all the time, we all do. There’s been hundreds of hours put in on this case since the new evidence came to light.”

Bennett said she will never give up hope that her daughter’s killer will someday be held accountable. She said she was deeply disappointed that the man police believe is responsible had been freed.

“It was a big letdown, very discouraging,” said Bennett, 49, as she sat in her living room, its walls adorned with pictures of her slain daughter. On the verge of tears, she added: “I believed in the system and it failed me.”

Bennett said she believes Placentia police “did the job they were suppose to” when they arrested the Anaheim man but was reeling in fresh grief since they told her about the prosecutor’s decision.

“Hopefully, one day we will get the truth, some sort of closure,” she said. “You feel you have to do what you can do to see the face of the person responsible, to see justice done.”

Torrez’s killing shook this close-knit community, inspiring hundreds of mourners to hang ribbon-strung white clay hearts from their rearview mirrors and hold candlelight vigils in packed churches.

The Cathy Torrez Learning Center in the Placita Santa Fe neighborhood was named for her, and Cal State Fullerton, where she was a junior majoring in sociology, established the Cathy Torrez Memorial Scholarship fund.

A $36,000 reward for information leading to her killer’s capture has gone unclaimed.

City Councilwoman Maria Moreno said word of the suspect’s arrest--and subsequent release--”spread like wildfire” through the community Thursday.

“Everyone is disappointed,” she said. “When Cathy was killed, everybody felt the blow. We felt it then and we’re feeling it again now.”

Torrez called her mother the night of Feb. 12, 1994, to let her know she was on her way home from her cashier job at Sav-On Drugs. But Torrez never arrived.

Her car was found a mile away, in a hospital parking lot. She had not been sexually assaulted or robbed, and relatives said she never would have stopped for a stranger.

Police said she fought her attacker in a ferocious struggle inside the Toyota. The interior was in disarray, with some parts broken, and investigators said they found hair and fibers that did not belong to the victim.

As for Torrez’s relatives and the community that so desperately wants to see the case resolved, Reynolds said: “We understand their frustration and their frustration with us. I’m sure they must feel hopeless sometimes.”

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Also contributing to this report were Times staff writers Esther Schrader and Steve Carney.