Hearing begins in gang killing case

BY RON SOBLE
DAILY SOUND CORRESPONDENT

A court hearing is scheduled to begin today in which a Santa Barbara youth is charged with the murder of a teenager during a gang melee on State Street, an act that still has folks shaking their heads at the recent spate of gang violence. Ricardo “Ricky” Juarez, 14, faces a murder charge in the stabbing death of 15-year-old Luis Angel Linares.
Juarez told the court he is innocent.
The prosecutor, Hilary Dozer, said in a telephone conversation on Friday that he can present enough evidence in a couple of days to convince Superior Court Judge Brian Hill that a formal trial should be held to determine whether police nabbed the right suspect.

“At the end of the day the evidence should clearly demonstrate that Juarez is responsible for the death of Angel Linares,” Dozer said.
The public defender, Karen Atkins, has indicated she might need more than a few days to present an argument at the hearing that her client, Juarez, is innocent.
Atkins was successful in gaining access to the Daily Sound’s 144 photos of the March 14 crime scene which were delivered on a disk to Judge Hill on Friday. Many of the photos, including those of Juarez, also were published in the Sound on Friday.
“There’s some very interesting and important material on those pictures,” Atkins told a reporter in brief telephone comments on Friday. She did not ellaborate.
The preliminary hearing that begins today comes amid a widening police investigation of yet another fatal gang stabbing in Santa Barbara last month. No suspect has yet been arrested in connection with this homicide.
In analyzing his trial options, Dozer decided to put forth the district attorney’s case against Juarez at a public preliminary hearing rather than accelerate the case through a closed-door grand jury indictment.
Dozer feels that widespread media coverage of the case can have a positive impact on youth violence.
Dozer acknowledged in an interview that he could have sought — and obtained — a quick murder indictment. Attorneys are not allowed to defend their client before a grand jury, thus accelerating the decision on whether a trial will go forward.
Instead, Dozer said, “I think having a preliminary hearing is a good idea in this case…I believe I can prove (the homicide) was gang-related, and at that time there will be some discussion that a person who is 14 years and one month old (at the time of the stabbing) is facing a certain consequence for that event that is gang-related.”
Such transparency also can have an effect on families with children who are at an age when kids can be influenced by gang members.
“I think that parents, when they read about it, will talk about it with their kids,” he said. “And when kids hear of it, they will talk among themselves.”
Acknowledging that this may be a naive thought, Dozer, the DA’s principal gang deputy since 1993, nevertheless said that going the route of a public preliminary hearing “may have an affect on putting a damper on some of the [gang] stuff [and] the rumors that we hear about the violence that’s contemplated in the future, and I think that’s good…it’ll get the word out.”
Dozer may be wasting his time with such thoughts, said Otilio Quintero, assistant director of Barrios Unidos, a Santa Cruz-based nonprofit that focuses on resolving youth violence. Gang members don’t care about court strategy such as preliminary hearings, he said in a telephone interview.
“If (the prosecutor) thinks that is going to put fear into young people, that ain’t going to work,” he said. “They’ve seen a lot worse.”
At the preliminary hearing, there is no jury. Judge Hill will decide when enough material has been presented by both sides to determine whether there is probable cause to go ahead with a formal trial.
Dozer said that the preliminary hearing process could benefit Atkins, the public defender, as well.
“The defense can put on something that mitigates her case,” he said. “If she has it and doesn’t put it on, then shame on her.”

Daily Sound staff writer Colby Frazier contributed to this report.