Crime & Safety
Trial to Begin for Trio Accused in Hemet Teen's Murder
All three defendants are charged with murder and a special circumstance allegation of killing in the course of a robbery.
Jury selection is scheduled to get underway Monday in the trial of a parolee and two accomplices accused of killing a 16-year-old boy while trying to take his mobile phone away from him on a Hemet street.
Francisco Roy Zavala, 22, of Hemet, Francisco Siordia, 19, of San Jacinto and Joseph Venegas, 17, of Hemet are accused in the Jan. 14, 2013, slaying of Eric Ronald Sargeant Jr. All three defendants are charged with murder and a special circumstance allegation of killing in the course of a robbery.
Though Siordia and Venegas were minors at the time of the crime, they’re being tried as adults and could face life in prison if convicted. Zavala is facing the death penalty if he’s found guilty. They’re all being held without bail -- Zavala at the Southwest Detention Center, and his co-defendants at Riverside Juvenile Hall.
Riverside County Superior Court Judge Stephen Gallon is expected to summon around 300 prospective jurors to the Southwest Justice Center in Murrieta for screening starting Monday morning as to their qualifications and availability. Jury selection will likely last several weeks.
Sargeant was stabbed nine to 10 times near the intersection of Acacia Avenue and Cherrywood Drive, only a couple of blocks from his home. According to sheriff’s investigators, Zavala and his co-defendants were walking to a liquor store when they spotted Sargeant alone, talking or texting on his phone.
The trio confronted him, demanding that he hand over the device, but Sargeant refused, at which point Zavala pulled a seven-inch kitchen knife and began slashing and stabbing the victim, witnesses and investigators alleged.
“There was testimony that he suffered a number of nicks and cuts, but there were also several significant injuries, including two stab wounds to the upper chest,” Deputy District Attorney Dan DeLimon told City News Service following a February 2014 preliminary hearing in the case.
Sargeant collapsed into a gutter after the attack, and passers-by came to his aid. The alleged assailants fled -- Siordia and Venegas to a relative’s house a half-mile away, and Zavala to his family’s residence in the same area, according to investigators.
Sargeant lived another five hours and was able to briefly speak with detectives prior to going into surgery, DeLimon said. The teen died on the operating table.
The defendants are all distantly related. During interviews with detectives, Siordia and Venegas both pointed to Zavala as the alleged aggressor in the attack and claimed they were not aware of what he planned to do, according to the prosecution.
Court records show Zavala has a 2011 conviction for burglary and a 2010 conviction for vandalism. Two weeks after he was sentenced to probation for the latter crime, he committed the burglary, resulting in a prison sentence, records indicated.
– By City News Service.
(Image via Shutterstock)
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