Post by CCADP on Aug 26, 2005 7:41:46 GMT -5
Jury convicts Medrano in 2003 gang murders
August 26,2005
Brittney Booth
The Monitor
EDINBURG — A jury found Rodolfo "Kreeper" Medrano guilty of capital murder Thursday in connection with the Tri-City Bomber case in which a January 2003 pseudo-cop raid-turned-massacre left six men dead.
Medrano glanced back at his family and appeared to mouth a message to them immediately after the jury announced its verdict.
His young wife’s devastated screams penetrated the Hidalgo County Courthouse shortly thereafter. Female sheriff’s deputies and bailiffs had to escort Juana Medrano out of the second-floor bathroom from which her wails interrupted other nearby court proceedings.
Her husband’s teary family members held her up as she left the courthouse sobbing.
She will find out today if her husband is sentenced to death, or life in prison, in connection with the murders on Monte Cristo Road in Edinburg on Jan. 5, 2003. The sentencing hearing will begin at 9:30 a.m. in state District Judge Mario Ramirez’s 332nd courtroom.
It took the jury about four hours of deliberation to declare Medrano guilty of providing lower ranking Tri-City Bomber gang members the SKS and AK-47 assault weapons used to slay the men. Police found the six men shot several times in and outside two small homes.
The victims were brothers Jerry Eugene Hidalgo, 24, and Ray Hidalgo, 30; Ruben Rolando Castillo, 32; Jimmy Edward Almendariz, 22; half-brothers Juan Delgado Jr., 32, and Juan Delgado III, 20.
Medrano went on trial Aug. 15 and is the third of 13 indicted in the murders to be convicted.
He ranked as a sergeant in the gang’s military-style chain of command and was in charge of keeping the gang’s money and weapons. He told police he was home watching movies with his wife the night of the murders.
Though prosecutors acknowledge Medrano was not present when the shootings occurred, he was tried under Texas’s law of parties, which says a person is criminally responsible for a crime committed by another if the person aids or conspires with another to commit a felony.
Hidalgo County Assistant District Attorneys Cregg Thompson and Judith Cantu argued Medrano could have "reasonably anticipated" his fellow gang members would commit murder, because in his conspiracy to rob marijuana, he lent high-powered assault weapons to help them carry out the offense.
The law of parties allows juries to give the death penalty if they believe the defendant could have anticipated murder.
"Six people were robbed and murdered by the weapons this defendant provided," Thompson told the jurors.
Though other gang members asked him to participate in the raid, Medrano’s refusal to physically join them indicates "he knew something bad was going to happen. He expected it and he anticipated it," Thompson said.
But Medrano’s defense attorney, Hector Villarreal, told jurors that prosecutors aimed to convict Medrano because he admitted to Edinburg police he belonged to the Tri-City Bombers. Every police officer that testified acknowledged there was no evidence that Medrano knew of a plan to commit murder before the slayings occurred.
Medrano, who worked as a computer technician at the Weslaco public library, spoke with police without a lawyer, although he had requested one, because he had nothing to hide, Villarreal said.
Villarreal declined to comment after the verdict.
Two other men are already on death row in connection with the Edinburg murders; Juan Raul Navarro Ramirez, 20, who police said participated in the raid — and Humberto "Gallo" Garza, 31, the gang’s captain who planned the robbery and drove the men to the crime scene. Another man indicted in the Edinburg murders is also on death row for the 2002 shootings of four women in Donna. Robert "Bones" Gene Garza, 22, was accused of killing the wrong women in a hit a jailed gang member ordered on a bar owner who testified against him.
Jeffrey "Dragon" Juarez, 28, is the next man scheduled for trial, also in the 332nd courtroom, and prosecutors have said he is the last case in which they will seek the death penalty. According to court testimony in the three Edinburg massacre trials, at the time of the murders Juarez headed the gang and approved the deadly raid from his home in the Houston suburb of Sugar Land.
In addition to Juarez, five others are awaiting separate trials in Hidalgo County Jail and police are still looking for two others involved in the case who are thought to be in Mexico: Ricardo "Rica" Cabello Martinez and Juan "Perro" Nuñez.
——
Brittney Booth covers courts and general assignments for The Monitor. You can reach her at (956) 683-4437.
August 26,2005
Brittney Booth
The Monitor
EDINBURG — A jury found Rodolfo "Kreeper" Medrano guilty of capital murder Thursday in connection with the Tri-City Bomber case in which a January 2003 pseudo-cop raid-turned-massacre left six men dead.
Medrano glanced back at his family and appeared to mouth a message to them immediately after the jury announced its verdict.
His young wife’s devastated screams penetrated the Hidalgo County Courthouse shortly thereafter. Female sheriff’s deputies and bailiffs had to escort Juana Medrano out of the second-floor bathroom from which her wails interrupted other nearby court proceedings.
Her husband’s teary family members held her up as she left the courthouse sobbing.
She will find out today if her husband is sentenced to death, or life in prison, in connection with the murders on Monte Cristo Road in Edinburg on Jan. 5, 2003. The sentencing hearing will begin at 9:30 a.m. in state District Judge Mario Ramirez’s 332nd courtroom.
It took the jury about four hours of deliberation to declare Medrano guilty of providing lower ranking Tri-City Bomber gang members the SKS and AK-47 assault weapons used to slay the men. Police found the six men shot several times in and outside two small homes.
The victims were brothers Jerry Eugene Hidalgo, 24, and Ray Hidalgo, 30; Ruben Rolando Castillo, 32; Jimmy Edward Almendariz, 22; half-brothers Juan Delgado Jr., 32, and Juan Delgado III, 20.
Medrano went on trial Aug. 15 and is the third of 13 indicted in the murders to be convicted.
He ranked as a sergeant in the gang’s military-style chain of command and was in charge of keeping the gang’s money and weapons. He told police he was home watching movies with his wife the night of the murders.
Though prosecutors acknowledge Medrano was not present when the shootings occurred, he was tried under Texas’s law of parties, which says a person is criminally responsible for a crime committed by another if the person aids or conspires with another to commit a felony.
Hidalgo County Assistant District Attorneys Cregg Thompson and Judith Cantu argued Medrano could have "reasonably anticipated" his fellow gang members would commit murder, because in his conspiracy to rob marijuana, he lent high-powered assault weapons to help them carry out the offense.
The law of parties allows juries to give the death penalty if they believe the defendant could have anticipated murder.
"Six people were robbed and murdered by the weapons this defendant provided," Thompson told the jurors.
Though other gang members asked him to participate in the raid, Medrano’s refusal to physically join them indicates "he knew something bad was going to happen. He expected it and he anticipated it," Thompson said.
But Medrano’s defense attorney, Hector Villarreal, told jurors that prosecutors aimed to convict Medrano because he admitted to Edinburg police he belonged to the Tri-City Bombers. Every police officer that testified acknowledged there was no evidence that Medrano knew of a plan to commit murder before the slayings occurred.
Medrano, who worked as a computer technician at the Weslaco public library, spoke with police without a lawyer, although he had requested one, because he had nothing to hide, Villarreal said.
Villarreal declined to comment after the verdict.
Two other men are already on death row in connection with the Edinburg murders; Juan Raul Navarro Ramirez, 20, who police said participated in the raid — and Humberto "Gallo" Garza, 31, the gang’s captain who planned the robbery and drove the men to the crime scene. Another man indicted in the Edinburg murders is also on death row for the 2002 shootings of four women in Donna. Robert "Bones" Gene Garza, 22, was accused of killing the wrong women in a hit a jailed gang member ordered on a bar owner who testified against him.
Jeffrey "Dragon" Juarez, 28, is the next man scheduled for trial, also in the 332nd courtroom, and prosecutors have said he is the last case in which they will seek the death penalty. According to court testimony in the three Edinburg massacre trials, at the time of the murders Juarez headed the gang and approved the deadly raid from his home in the Houston suburb of Sugar Land.
In addition to Juarez, five others are awaiting separate trials in Hidalgo County Jail and police are still looking for two others involved in the case who are thought to be in Mexico: Ricardo "Rica" Cabello Martinez and Juan "Perro" Nuñez.
——
Brittney Booth covers courts and general assignments for The Monitor. You can reach her at (956) 683-4437.