Parents of Teen Killed by Off-Duty Cop want Grand Jury to Indict

Seventeen-year-old Jonathen Santellana was fatally shot by off-duty Navasota police officer, Rey Garza, in 2013. According to investigator Cam Cope, President of Auto Fire & Safety Consultants, Inc., Jonathen received the fatal shots while protecting his friend from Garza’s fire.

The Auto Fire & Safety Consultants (AFSC) report, dated Nov. 6, 2015, concluded “Rey Garza recklessly fired multiple bullets at Jonathen Santellana, his vehicle and passenger, while Jonathen posed no threat.”

In an interview, attorney Randall Kallinen – representing Santellana’s parents – said that he is currently compiling a grand jury package, which will include the AFSC report along with new eyewitness information, in an effort to secure Garza’s indictment.

“The time for official oppression [by a police officer, a misdemeanor under Texas law,] has passed so we’re trying to get him on a felony,” said Kallinen, who specializes in police misconduct litigation.

Santellana’s parents will go directly to the grand jury, bypassing prosecutors, which is highly unusual. “I’ve only heard of one other time where someone attempted that,” said Kallinen. “In that other case the grand jury did indict a police officer, that was also a police officer misconduct matter.”

Kallinen explained the decision to bypass prosecutors: “In our opinion the prosecutors are very pro-police … we don’t believe that the Harris County District Attorney wants to vigorously prosecute excessive force by police officers.”

Rey Garza’s fatal shooting of Jonathen Santellana

On the evening of Nov. 13, 2013, Santellana and his friend, Kalee Marsteller, were in Santellana’s parked car at the Villages of Copperfield Apartments, Houston, where Garza was employed as a “courtesy officer.”

Santellana was in the driver’s seat of his car, with Marsteller in the passenger seat, when Garza approached, allegedly to investigate a green leafy substance he saw Santellana putting into a prescription bottle.

Garza claims he clearly identified himself as a police officer when he approached Santellana’s car. He also claims he was in danger – trapped between his own car and Santellana’s car as Santellana reversed – when he began shooting into Santellana’s vehicle.

According to Marsteller’s testimony and a report by the Navasota Examiner, Santellana was breathing and conscious when he exited his vehicle after being shot by Garza. The AFSC report states that Garza did not check on Santellana or provide medical assistance, which would have been part of his basic training as a police officer.

Santellana was pronounced dead on arrival at North Cypress Hospital.

Findings of the AFSC report

The findings of the AFSC investigation refute Garza’s claims: “Mr. Garza [sic] testimony is not consistent with any of the factual evidence or the two eyewitnesses.”

According to the AFSC report, Marsteller testified that she “only remembers seeing the Hispanic male, gym clothes and tattoos, beating on the driver’s side window with the gun. He had no badge or identification.”

Both Marsteller and a second eyewitness, Sheila Moreno, said Santellana’s car was driving away from Garza when he opened fire, and Garza was never endangered by Santellana’s vehicle. The two eyewitness accounts are consistent with the location in which the shell casings were found, but Garza’s account is not.

The AFSC report concluded that Santellana was simply trying to get away from what he perceived as a dangerous situation: an unidentified, armed Hispanic male attempting to enter his vehicle without consent.

The report also concluded that Garza “used excessive and deadly force on a vehicle that posed no threat to him.”

A third attempt to indict Rey Garza

Garza’s case first went before a Harris Country grand jury in 2014, and the jury chose not to indict Garza due to insufficient evidence.

Kallinen said he recently learned that in 2014 “prosecutors did not put Ms. Moreno in front of the grand jury.” This was in spite of the fact that Moreno had given a statement to police on the day of the shooting.

Late in 2015, Santellana’s parents went directly to a grand jury in a second attempt to have Garza indicted. His mother said: “He was a great kid. I felt like justice wasn’t served and I felt like they didn’t give us a chance.”

That second grand jury, however, also no-billed Garza.

Now, Santellana’s parents are preparing to present new eyewitness evidence from Moreno to a grand jury in a third attempt to have Garza indicted.

Kallinen has obtained a recorded interview from Moreno, which supports the contention that Garza was not in danger when he shot Santellana.  Kallinen will include Moreno’s interview as part of the new grand jury package in the hope of strengthening the already compelling evidence against Garza.

Justice for Jonathen

The AFSC’s independent investigation suggests Jonathen Santellana was the sort of kid who would protect a friend with his life:

Two bullets entered the backside of Jonathen Santellana’s, [sic] head and back causing massive internal bodily damage that resulted in his death … Yet no bullet holes were ever documented in the driver’s seat or head rest, leaving this investigator to the belief that when Jonathen pushed Kalee down, as she testified to, Jonathen would have been leaning over her to protect her, exposing the back of his head and back.

The report also suggests Rey Garza is the sort of man who would not check on the still-breathing minor he just shot, let alone provide medical assistance, and would falsify testimony in order to get himself off the hook.

The 2015 grand jury package, released to the Free Thought Project, contained the following statement:

Rey Garza should be indicted for murder, manslaughter, criminally negligent homicide, and/or aggravated assault with a deadly weapon as probable cause exists. Garza was not in danger when he shot Jonathen Santellana in the back and back of the head killing him. Like most criminal homicide suspects Rey Garza has come up with an excuse … The public and parents of Jonathen Santellana want justice to be done.

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