Pre-trial motions were filed earlier this week in the re-trial of Antolin Garcia-Torres, the man accused of killing 15-year-old Morgan Hill girl Sierra LaMar while she was on her way to school in March 2012.
The case of the 2012 murder of Sierra LaMar was one of several that rocked the Bay Area in the last decade, at least in part because LaMar's body has never been found. And while Antolin Garcia-Torres, now 35, was convicted of her murder in 2017 and sentenced to life without parole, his conviction was overturned earlier this year by California's Sixth District Court of Appeal. The appellate court found that the court that tried Garcia-Torres had improperly allowed him to be tried simultaneously for the kidnappings of three women three years before the murder, in 2012, on top of other issues with the trial.
The Santa Clara County DA's office has opted to retry Garcia-Torres for the murder, and jury selection is now underway. Lawyers for both sides filed a bevy of pre-trial motions on Monday, and among them, as KRON4 reports, was a motion by defense attorney Alfonso Lopez to dismiss the case altogether on double jeopardy grounds — on the grounds that he has already been convicted once for this crime, though double jeopardy typically only applies when an acquittal has occurred.
Lopez argued before Superior Court Judge Brian Buckelew, per KRON 4, that "new evidence was uncovered" exposing misconduct by prosecutors which was "intended to deny Mr. Garcia-Torres a right to an acquittal."
Buckelew has not yet ruled on the motion. He has already denied a motion by Lopez to recuse himself from the case due to his former role in the Santa Clara County DA's Office, which Lopez argued gave Buckelew a bias against his client.
Lopez and co-counsel Mishya Singh filed a separate motion seeking to have an interrogation of Garcia-Torres thrown out, arguing that the Santa Clara County Sheriff’s Office had violated his Miranda rights.
"At the substation, the sergeants placed Mr. Garcia-Torres in an interview room and questioned him for approximately 50 minutes before advising him of his Miranda rights," said the defense in the filing, per KRON4.
In yet another motion, the defense tried to get some of the only physical evidence in the case thrown out. Strands of LaMar’s hair and traces of DNA were reportedly found Garcia-Torres’s Volkswagen Jetta, but the defense argued that this evidence had been mishandled and contaminated back in 2012.
And lastly, the defense moved to prevent the prosecution from discussing a sexual motive in the crime. In court documents, per KRON4, Deputy District Attorney Thomas Butterfoss filed an opposition motion, writing, "The argument that the defendant’s abduction of Sierra was sexually motivated is an entirely proper inference based on the anticipated evidence."
The prosecution further argued, "There was no preexisting relationship between Sierra and the defendant that would have given rise to a dispute or anger leading him to attack her. Sierra’s five dollars in lunch money and other belongings were left behind … eliminating robbery as a motive. The only other potential motives are sexual, or that the defendant killed Sierra for the pleasure of indiscriminately killing."
Back in June, the judge ruled that the prosecution will be barred from discussing premeditation, because the higher court had found that there was insufficient evidence to prove that the crime was planned.
Among other evidence of Garcia-Torres's guilt is surveillance video showing him leaving the mobile home park where he lived and turning in the direction of LaMar's bus stop — right around the time the teen had just missed her bus to school.
Prosecutors' theory of the case has always been that Garcia-Torres, who had a history of abducting women using a stun gun, had abducted LaMar and sexually assaulted her, ultimately killing her and disposing of the body to cover up his crime.
During his 14 years behind bars, to date, Garcia-Torres has maintained his innocence.
It's not clear when opening arguments in the retrial will begin.
Previously: Killer Of Sierra LaMar Gets Life Without Parole
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