Suspect Not Charged Yet in Teen’s Death

The prime suspect in the December slaying of 14-year-old Kali Manley of Oak View appeared in court briefly Thursday but has yet to be charged in the girl’s homicide.

Attorneys for David Alvarez, 22, of Ojai say they expect the attorney general’s office to file murder charges in the case. Local authorities completed their investigation nearly a month ago.

But Deputy Atty. Gen. Michael A. Katz said Thursday that state investigators are still reviewing the case. He declined to say when his office may file charges against Alvarez.

“We hope to do it soon; it’s a serious case,” Katz said, standing outside the Ventura courtroom in which Alvarez appeared on two unrelated cases being handled by state prosecutors.

Alvarez is charged with threatening a woman and brandishing a gun outside the convenience store in which he was last seen with Manley on Dec. 20, authorities said. That case was postponed to March 25.

He also faces a misdemeanor battery charge for allegedly assaulting his 20-year-old wife, Brooke, last August. That case is set for trial April 12.

A Nordhoff High School freshman, Manley disappeared after visiting a girlfriend’s house the same night she was reportedly seen at the Miramonte convenience store with Alvarez and another man.

A weeklong search for the girl ended when Alvarez led authorities to her body, hidden in a drainage pipe near Pine Mountain in the Ventura County back country. She had been strangled, and authorities say she may also have been the victim of an attempted rape.

State prosecutors agreed Feb. 2 to take over the homicide investigation and Alvarez’s other cases after Dist. Atty. Michael D. Bradbury raised concerns about “the appearance of impropriety” if his office handled the cases. Bradbury has been friends with the suspect’s parents, Eugene and Marie Alvarez, for several years.