Testimony of Train Crash Witness Calls Suicide Theory Into Question

Ever since he drove his vehicle onto the railroad tracks, triggering the deadly Metrolink train wreck, Juan Manuel Alvarez has maintained that the tragedy was an abortive suicide attempt and that he didn’t mean to hurt anyone.

But on Tuesday, a witness undercut that theory by recounting how Alvarez, before abandoning his sport utility vehicle, may have tried to ensure that it would catch fire or even explode. Eleven people died in the Jan. 26 crash.

Testifying in a preliminary hearing to decide whether Alvarez must stand trial, Douglas Ross, a sanitation worker for the city of Glendale, said that he saw a man in a gray poncho emerge from a vehicle -- resembling a truck with a camper shell -- near the Chevy Chase Drive rail crossing in Glendale shortly before the January disaster. The man liberally doused the vehicle with liquid before getting back in and driving toward the tracks.

“He was running around the truck shaking the bottle on the truck.... He started on the roof, then went to the [hood], then went around to the other side,” Ross said, under questioning by Deputy Dist. Atty. Alan Jackson.

According to police, the poncho-wearing man was Alvarez, and the liquid he splashed over his Jeep Grand Cherokee was gasoline.

Alvarez, 26, is charged with 11 counts of murder as well as arson in the chain-reaction crash in which a southbound Metrolink train struck his SUV, hit a freight train and then smashed into a northbound Metrolink train.

If the construction worker is found guilty of intentionally causing the crash, he could face the death penalty, although prosecutors haven’t said whether they will seek his execution.

Establishing what happened before the train wreck could shed light on Alvarez’s intentions before the disaster.

“The question is culpability,” said his lawyer, Eric Chase, outside the courtroom. Whether Alvarez is ultimately convicted of first-degree murder or lesser manslaughter charges, Chase added, “depends on what was in his head.”

In an earlier interview, Alvarez’s family members said he had a history of mental illness and suicidal behavior.

But authorities say Alvarez was trying to fake an attempted suicide, possibly to gain sympathy from his estranged wife.

Inside the downtown Los Angeles courtroom of Superior Court Judge William R. Pounders on Tuesday, victims’ families filled the front row.

As witnesses testified, Alvarez scribbled on a yellow legal pad.

“This is the first time I’ve seen him, and it took my breath away,” said Rita Kay Tutino, the widow of Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Deputy James Tutino, a Metrolink rider killed in the crash. “He’s walking in and my husband’s not.”

“He knew when the train hit his car, it would blow up,” Tutino said, eyes welling with tears outside the courtroom. “I fully feel he knew what he was doing.”

Also Tuesday, sanitation worker Edward Branch testified that he saw a man -- whom authorities say was Alvarez -- run away from an SUV-like vehicle parked on the tracks moments before it was hit by a Metrolink train. After the crash, the man raised his arms into the air and fell to his knees, Branch said.

On the witness stand, Metrolink engineers recalled the horrors of the crash.

One passenger, a regular on train No. 100, had eyes “as big as softballs” as the train hurtled toward the SUV, engineer Bruce Gray recalled. That passenger, Scott McKeown, died in the crash.

Charles Wright, engineer for the northbound train No. 901, called Jan. 26 “the worst day in my whole career.”

Wright repeatedly telephoned for paramedics because he was in shock and couldn’t hear the sirens arriving, he said.

Witness testimony continues today. After the hearing concludes, the judge will decide whether there is enough evidence to bring Alvarez to trial.