Saturday, June 27, 2009

Murder? unlikely, accidental then?


Boy this is a toughie isn't it?

Present it to a Grand Jury for them to sort out. Either its a manslaughter or criminally negligent homicide, most likely.

Could the fellow who did this form the requisite culpable mental state to make it something more?

I don't know, do you?

Id know it was a shame and tragedy that this happened.

My heartfelt condolences to the family of Juan Lara.

Boy's wrestling death ruled homicide
By Robert Crowe - Express-News

Authorities have ruled as homicide the death of a 12-year-old boy who stopped breathing after wrestling with an 18-year-old mentally challenged man last month.

Juan Lara died on May 16, after Elijio Esquedo body-slammed the boy to the floor of a friend's apartment at the Wheatley Courts in the 1800 block of Hays Street, police said.

The Bexar County Medical Examiner's Office ruled Friday that the cause of death was the combined effects of a physical altercation and severe myocarditis. The manner of death was a homicide.

Myocarditis is inflammation of the heart muscle, often caused by an infection. It has been linked to sudden death in young adults.

Esquedo, a convicted sex offender who was diagnosed with mental retardation at a young age, has not been charged in Lara's death.

The Express-News reported on May 25 that Esquedo was in violation of the sex offender registry at the time of Lara's death because he had not updated his address with the Texas Department of Public Safety. On Friday, a month later, police still had not arrested him for that violation — a felony — even though San Antonio police had sought an arrest warrant three days before Lara's death.

Esquedo told police he was roughhousing with Lara when the child stopped breathing after the older teen body-slammed him in a bedroom.

“It was just an accident,” said Esquedo's father, Elijio Esquedo Sr.

Lara's mother, Maria Salazar, did not know her son had a heart condition.

“He would wrestle all the time, but he never got sick,” she said. “Something more happened with (Esquedo).”

She thinks the mention of a physical altercation in the homicide ruling shows that Esquedo should be charged with a crime.