Suspect in Slaying Faces 2 More Charges

The district attorney’s office added two new charges against a Meiners Oaks man accused of fatally shooting an acquaintance and kidnapping a taxi driver before careening off the highway alone above Santa Barbara.

Daniel Joseph Bonilla, 27, already faced charges that include murder, use of a firearm in commission of a murder, kidnapping for the purpose of carjacking, and robbery.

On Wednesday, the district attorney’s office added charges of witness intimidation and felon in possession of a firearm, said Deputy Dist. Atty. Richard Simon, who is handling the case.

Bonilla allegedly shot Thomas Mahl in the head at a Casitas Springs trailer park in early December after a dispute.

After the shooting, Bonilla walked to a nearby house, where an elderly couple--who were unaware of the shooting--called a taxi for him, according to sheriff’s deputies.

Authorities said Bonilla then kidnapped cab driver F.G. Fencher, forcing him to drive north on the Ventura Freeway toward Santa Barbara before releasing him unharmed in Goleta and continuing on his own.

Bonilla was arrested a short time later, after he lost control of the taxi north of Santa Barbara, careened 90 feet off the freeway and crashed.

He crawled from the wreckage and hiked to the road where he was met by authorities.

Mahl, 36, of Ojai, remained on life support for four days at Ventura County Medical Center before dying of the gunshot wound.

The witness intimidation charge was added after Bonilla allegedly “called from jail and basically communicated a threat to the witness--’You’re dead,’ or something like that,” Simon said.

He allegedly called a woman at the trailer park in Casitas Springs who witnessed much of the dispute and has since talked to police.

Simon said that unless his office receives additional information, it will not pursue the death penalty for Bonilla, because there is no evidence of premeditation.

Bonilla is scheduled for a preliminary hearing on March 23.