Circa 50 people sat in the gallery of the courthouse’s largest room on Tuesday, filling the benches behind 51st District Attorney Allison Palmer and assistant Meagan White as they declared themselves ready for the trial of 18-year-old Daniel Uvalle.
Charged with capital murder of multiple persons, Uvalle sat still in the courtroom, clad in a dark blue and white plaid button-down and khakis, as Palmer read the indictment, leaning forward to say “not guilty” when asked to enter his plea.
Palmer then proceeded to make her opening statements, which were brief and outlined a chain of events beginning with a physical fight between Uvalle’s co-defendant Johnny Garcia, and deceased victim Alvaro Carrillo, Jr. on Sept. 1, 2013.
A shotgun was drawn during the fight, Palmer told the jury, but when the empty gun failed to dissuade the two men from fighting, Garcia and Uvalle left with the weapon, returning later to the apartment full of young adults both armed, Garcia dressed in a bulletproof vest.
According to the state, Garcia then attempted to fire his weapon at Carrillo, but when he couldn’t manage to get off a shot, Uvalle gave him his own weapon, which Garcia then used to shoot and kill Alvaro Carrillo, before training it on Tabitha Freeman and killing her with a second shot.
Pointing to the law of parties, which essentially states that an accomplice who aids, promotes or encourages the commission of a crime is just as guilty as the principal actor, Palmer told the jury she expected the evidence would show that Uvalle is guilty of the murders of both Freeman and Carrillo.
When the state had finished, defense attorney Fred Brigman spoke to the emotion of the jury, describing his client as a boy who had grown up with no father, an “adult” of only four days at the time the crime was committed, who had followed and feared Garcia, the true perpetrator of the crime.
Brigman said he didn’t disagree with many of the facts, but was certain that his client had never meant for anyone to get hurt or killed.
After Brigman had finished, Palmer called the state’s first witness, San Angelo police officer Tony Lopez, who had arrived on scene just after officer Bradshaw at 3:18 a.m. on Sept. 1, 2013.
Lopez and Bradshaw were met outside by William Baskin, a resident of the apartment complex that lived in the room across the hall from the crime scene. Weston showed the officers to a hallway, Lopez testified, where witnesses Idalia Limon, Jessie Sanchez and Holly Baskin stood and waited.
Ushering the young adults into room #9, Lopez and Bradshaw did a safety sweep, entering room #11, where the murders had taken place.
“As we entered the living room, I noticed two deceased subjects,” officer Lopez said. “I noticed a female on the couch and a male on the floor in front of her.”
Lopez went on to describe blood splatters observed on both of the room’s couches, on the wall and on the living room floor.
With warning of the graphic nature of the content, attorney Meagan White then inserted a video for the jury, made by Lopez on the night of the murders as he went over the crime scene.
Silence fell over the courtroom for the first several minutes, which started in the parking lot of the Greenwood complex and followed a line of yellow crime scene tape that the officer ducked under while the scene on screen shook in step.
As he entered the doorway the tension in the courtroom rose, quiet sniffles heard from the various rows of benches that had filled with both victims’ loved ones. The silence was broken as the camera entered the living room, loud sobs and heavy tears echoing in the room as the camera turned on the two victims, both seated with their bodies slumped over facedown, lifeless.
A bright blue shirt bearing the words “Duarte Family Reunion” lay on the floor near Carrillo, a shirt he’d received at a reunion that weekend for his mother’s side of the family. The same shirt both Jesse Sanchez and Carrillo’s girlfriend, Idalia Limon, were wearing when the police arrived.
After the video had ended, Lopez pointed out items on still photographs, drawing attention to yellow and black bandanas found on the floor and coffee table, a cell phone lying in a pool of blood and evidence of the crime that had just been committed.
“You see blood splatter and small pieces of body debris in the photo,” he said, as White displayed an image of a southwestern-style couch with a dark spot on it.
After answering a few brief questions from the defense, Lopez stepped down and Palmer called Alvaro Carrillo’s twin sister to the stand, Elvira Carrillo.
Elvira explained to the jury that she and her brother grew up in San Angelo, and that her brother had attended Central High School. At the time of his death, she said, he was planning on getting his GED and going to work for his father.
Elvira said she had met the defendant, Danielle Uvalle, on a couple of occasions, but didn’t know him well. His accomplice, however, Johnny Garcia, who had pulled the trigger, was well known to the Carrillo family.
“He (Alvaro) was a real good friend to Johnny,” Elvira said. “He took care of [Johnny] like a little brother.”
As Palmer displayed photos of Alvaro with his nephews on the day he was killed, his sister broke out in tears. She hadn’t attended the family reunion that weekend, she said, but had last talked to her brother two to three days before he was killed.
Following the emotional background provided by Carrillo’s sister, Palmer called Tasha Calder to the stand, a close cousin of victim Tabitha Freeman.
Calder explained that she and her cousin had grown up close, and that Tabitha had attended Lake View. She wanted to go to Howard College and get a GED, Calder explained, then continue in general studies.
“Tabitha was basically living life at the time,” Calder said. “She had a couple of jobs as a waitress. She lived for the day.”
The two girls talked on almost a daily basis, Calder said, including on the night Tabitha was murdered.
“She had posted on my Facebook that she loved me and she would always love me because we’re family,” Calder said, fighting back tears. “She called me at around 10 o’clock and said that she wanted me to come pick her up from a bar she was at…”
That night, Calder was on bed rest due to an illness and was unable to pick up her cousin, she said. She told her that the door was open if she wanted to come in, and later learned the tragic news of Tabitha’s death.
While the trial went on, Alavaro’s mother, Terry Duarte, and Tabitha’s mother, Karen Freeman, waited in the halls to hear reports of what had happened from family members inside the courtroom.
Both of the mothers had been subpoenaed for their victim impact statements, and as a result, are not permitted to view the trial in the courtroom until they’ve testified and been excused.
As family and friends streamed out of the courtroom at quarter till 5 on Tuesday, they paused to embrace the mothers with their faces streaked with tears and relayed what they had seen and heard.
Tuesday concluded with an emotional showing of two photographs of Tabitha Freeman, and the court is set to convene at 9 a.m. in courtroom A.
Expected to testify on Wednesday are the witnesses who were present in the apartment during the shooting, detectives and medical examiners.
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