Lawyers Accuse D.A. of Ignoring Evidence in Case

A running battle between Ventura and Santa Barbara county authorities escalated Tuesday as lawyers for a convicted murderer accused Santa Barbara prosecutors of withholding evidence and ignoring new findings that they say proves their client is innocent.

Oxnard resident Efren Cruz’s lawyers say Santa Barbara prosecutors failed to turn over police reports and other evidence suggesting another man, Gerardo Reyes, was the likely suspect in a deadly 1997 shooting in downtown Santa Barbara.

They also allege in court papers filed Tuesday that a secretly taped confession recently obtained by the Ventura County district attorney’s office proves Reyes, 28, is the admitted gunman.

“The people have demonstrated both prior and subsequent to the trial in this case that they had no interest in evidence which implicated anyone in the shooting other than Efren Cruz,” defense attorney Kevin DeNoce wrote.

DeNoce suggested that politically motivated prosecutors were unwilling to admit they put the wrong man behind bars--an allegation Santa Barbara County Deputy Dist. Atty. Gerald Franklin sharply disputes.

“No one in this office has any desire to keep a man in prison for political reasons,” Franklin said.

The defense motion is the latest salvo in an increasingly tense dispute between Ventura and Santa Barbara authorities over the shooting.

Reyes admitted during a secretly taped jailhouse confession that he fired the deadly rounds and let his 26-year-old cousin, Cruz, take the blame. The recorded statements prompted Santa Barbara County Superior Court Judge Frank Ochoa to grant a June 4 hearing, in which he will consider whether to overturn Cruz’s conviction.

To bolster their position that Reyes, not Cruz, pulled the trigger, defense attorneys DeNoce and Phil Dunn recently demanded access to early investigative reports in the case. Evidence handed over to them by prosecutors earlier this month included police reports documenting Reyes’ alleged involvement in other gang-related shootings in Oxnard.

Lawyers also learned that a gang expert, Oxnard Police Det. Dennis McMaster, told Santa Barbara police a day after the shooting that Reyes was a likely suspect given his criminal history.

“At the time, I did not know if Gerardo [Reyes] was the shooter, however, it was my opinion that he would be because of his history and propensity for shooting,” McMaster wrote in a sworn declaration.

That information was never shown to Cruz’s original defense lawyer before trial, DeNoce states in court papers.

DeNoce and Dunn are now asking Ochoa to broaden the scope of the upcoming hearing so they can present additional evidence to bolster their contention that Cruz is innocent and should be set free.

“It is time for Mr. Cruz to be released from custody, and it is time for the Santa Barbara district attorney to admit that the real . . . shooter escaped apprehension,” DeNoce said.

But Santa Barbara County prosecutors say the defense argument is flawed.

Franklin said his office was under no legal obligation to share the Oxnard police reports about Reyes with Cruz’s trial lawyer in 1997. He plans to file a written response by the end of the week opposing DeNoce’s request to introduce such evidence at the upcoming hearing.

He added, however, that if credible evidence exists to show someone else committed the shooting, then Cruz deserves to be set free.

The shooting occurred after two groups of men, some linked to gangs, exchanged taunts in a State Street bar.

The confrontation spilled out to a parking lot at Anacapa and Ortega streets. Shots were fired. Michael Torres, 23, of Santa Barbara, was killed, and James Lee Miranda, 21, of Santa Ynez, was seriously wounded.

Santa Barbara police found Cruz, an Army veteran, walking in the parking structure right after the incident and arrested him. They found gunshot residue on his hands, and a motorist leaving the garage that night later identified him as the gunman.