Charge Is Reduced in Slaying of Oxnard Teen

Prosecutors reduced murder charges Thursday against an Oxnard gang member accused of shooting a rival gang member during a street confrontation five months ago.

Anthony Vasquez, 19, will face a charge of voluntary manslaughter rather than murder, because there is evidence Vasquez thought he was defending himself when he shot Dino Zarate on Sept. 1, prosecutors said.

“He had the belief that he had the right to exercise self-defense,” said Deputy Dist. Atty. Richard Simon, who filed new charges Thursday. “The [rival gang members] were in his neighborhood, they were making threats and they were carrying weapons.”

Vasquez is expected to plead guilty next week in Ventura County Superior Court.

He is also charged with using a firearm and being a gang member in possession of a firearm.

He could face up to 21 years in prison.

Zarate, a 19-year-old college sophomore, was shot in the head while driving a carload of friends through south Oxnard.

He died behind the wheel of his blue Ford Mustang as his friends fled the scene.

Zarate’s friends, members of a La Colonia gang, were cruising a street claimed by Vasquez’s gang as its territory, prosecutors said.

They got out of the car, yelled gang slogans and walked toward Vasquez holding pipes and sticks, witnesses said during a preliminary hearing in November.

Vasquez pulled out a gun, shouted his gang’s name and fired, hitting Zarate in the head, authorities said.

Dennis McMaster, a gang expert with the Oxnard Police Department, testified at the preliminary hearing that Vasquez is a known member of a south Oxnard gang and Zarate belonged to a rival Colonia gang.

The two gangs are longtime rivals with scattered territories throughout the city.

Vasquez’s attorney, Deputy Public Defender Randy Tucker, had argued for a lesser charge and said he was glad the district attorney’s office agreed.

The defendant “was minding his own business” when Zarate and his friends appeared, Tucker said. “He wasn’t looking for trouble. Trouble came looking for him.”

A week before the shooting, Vasquez and his younger brother had been attacked by members of the same rival gang, Tucker said.

Vasquez was tempted to take his chances with the jury by arguing self-defense, Tucker said, but was worried how jurors would react to his gang affiliation and the fact he pulled the gun.

Tim Mayworm, with whom Zarate lived the last two years, said it didn’t matter if Vasquez was charged with murder or manslaughter.

Instead, he said, it was more important that Vasquez understand he killed someone with a bright future.

That September afternoon, Zarate was on his way back to school at St. Mary’s University near San Francisco.

Mayworm said he didn’t think Zarate was a threat to Vasquez, despite the defendant’s self-defense claim.

“He was in his car and his intent was to go to college,” Mayworm said.

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Times staff writer Tina Dirmann contributed to this story.