Latest news with #DavidBreaux
CBS News
11 hours ago
- CBS News
Mistrial declared in Davis stabbings trial; jury found Carlos Dominguez not guilty of first-degree murder
What comes next in the Davis serial stabbing case after mistrial What comes next in the Davis serial stabbing case after mistrial What comes next in the Davis serial stabbing case after mistrial A mistrial has been declared in the trial of Carlos Dominguez, the former UC Davis student accused of going on a deadly stabbing spree. On Friday, the Yolo County jury revealed that they unanimously found Dominguez not guilty on first-degree murder. On second-degree murder,10 jurors found Dominguez not guilty while two voted guilty. With the case declared a mistrial by the judge, a new trial will take place on the second-degree count. A new trial setting conference is set for July 24. Carlos Dominguez in Yolo County Court on June 27. Dominguez is suspected in the 2023 stabbing spree that saw two people, David Breaux and Karim Abou Najm, killed and a third, Kimberlee Guillory, wounded. Proceedings were initially put on hold after the former UC Davis student's arrest after he was found not competent to stand trial. However, the trial resumed towards the end of 2024 when a reevaluation determined Dominguez was now competent. Jurors were deciding on the charges of first-degree murder for the killings of Breaux and Najm, and attempted murder in Guillory's stabbing. Closing arguments concluded on June 6, with Dominguez's defense claiming he was suffering from schizophrenia at the time of the attacks. Prosecutors focused their case on proving the actions were premeditated, regardless of Dominguez's mental state. A number of people – including Dominguez's family, his ex-girlfriend, a former professor, along with health care professionals and law enforcement officers – were brought in to testify in the trial. Dominguez himself took the stand in his own defense, a move legal experts said was unusual. Prosecutors have said they would not seek the death penalty against Dominguez if he is found guilty.
CBS News
19 hours ago
- CBS News
Davis stabbings trial judge says jury has reached verdict on first-degree murder, hung on second-degree murder
A verdict has been reached in the trial of Carlos Dominguez, the former UC Davis student accused of going on a deadly stabbing spree, the judge says. The judge believes there is a verdict reached on first-degree murder, but there is a hung jury on the second-degree murder charge. More details will be released as the proceedings continue on Friday. Dominguez is suspected in the 2023 stabbing spree that saw two people, David Breaux and Karim Abou Najm, killed and a third, Kimberlee Guillory, wounded. Proceedings were initially put on hold after the former UC Davis student's arrest after he was found not competent to stand trial. However, the trial resumed towards the end of 2024 when a reevaluation determined Dominguez was now competent. Jurors are deciding on the charges of first-degree murder for the killings of Breaux and Najm, and attempted murder in Guillory's stabbing. Closing arguments concluded on June 6, with Dominguez's defense claiming he was suffering from schizophrenia at the time of the attacks. Prosecutors focused their case on proving the actions were premeditated, regardless of Dominguez's mental state. A number of people – including Dominguez's family, his ex-girlfriend, a former professor, along with health care professionals and law enforcement officers – were brought in to testify in the trial. Dominguez himself took the stand in his own defense, a move legal experts said was unusual. Prosecutors have said they would not seek the death penalty against Dominguez if he is found guilty.
Yahoo
24-05-2025
- Yahoo
Experts detail Dominguez's mental slide in jail as Davis stabbing trial presses on
Carlos Reales Dominguez sat motionless at the defense table Friday as experts testified to his mental decline at Yolo County Jail following his May 2023 arrest in the serial Davis stabbings that left two dead and another seriously injured. Testimony continued Friday in Yolo Superior Court in the guilt phase of the former UC Davis student's murder trial. Dominguez's defense, a week into its case before Judge Samuel McAdam, is arguing that Dominguez showed symptoms of schizophrenia at the time of the knife killings in late April and early May 2023, symptoms that worsened while jailed for the crimes. Dominguez has pleaded not guilty and not guilty by reason of insanity in the stabbing deaths of David Breaux, 50, and Karim Abou Najm, 20, at Davis' Central and Sycamore parks; and the wounding of Kimberlee Guillory, then 64, in her tent in the city's downtown. Jurors will decide whether Dominguez was sane at the time of the crimes in the second phase of the scheduled 10-week trial. Experts included Amy Gutierrez, the mental health coordinator who monitored Dominguez while he was on suicide watch in those first months inside Yolo County Jail. Gutierrez told jurors that Dominguez had dramatically dropped weight, spent long periods staring at the walls in his cell and had stopped showering or brushing his teeth, before being sent to a Davis hospital on a mental health hold. 'I believed he was greatly disabled,' Gutierrez told Yolo County deputy public defender Daniel Hutchinson, of Dominguez's placement on a mental hold. Dominguez was on suicide watch for more than 100 days in Yolo County custody, experts testified, before that watch was lifted in August 2023. Dominguez was also beginning to show 'significantly more serious symptoms' of mental illness, Patricia Tyler, the psychiatrist and former Napa State Hospital director, who also evaluated Dominguez, said. Tyler described a man 'very dirty, poorly groomed and barely speaking,' who appeared to show no expression or emotion, a sign of schizophrenia, she said. 'Here was a man in jail for the first time on a charge of murder with no sign of distress,' Tyler testified. 'His affect was quite unusual.' Jurors on Friday afternoon also returned to the nearly seven-hour interview of Dominguez by Davis detectives at Davis Police Department that led to his arrest, watching as detectives pressed him for details on the stabbing of Guillory, the lone survivor of the Davis attacks, inside her tent near Second and L streets. 'Look at me, John,' Davis detective Steve Ramos said at one point, calling Dominguez by the name he gave Davis police. 'What did you do, John? What did you do at the tent? Help us understand. How did you get into the tent?' Later, Ramos questioned Dominguez about the first victim, Breaux, the tactical knife found stowed in Dominguez's shopping tote and the leather knife sheath recovered days earlier by crime scene technicians next to Breaux's body at Central Park. Ramos' questions were met with long pauses and short answers. Dominguez, seated next to Hutchinson at the defense table, watched intently as his videotaped self struggled to answer the detective's questions. 'Why do you have that knife?' Ramos asked. Dominguez zipped up his jacket at one point while officers left the interview room for food and prepared to leave when he was stopped by an officer. He wanted to take a walk, Dominguez told the officer on video. The same officer asked Dominguez what he was thinking about. 'Schoolwork,' Dominguez said. Jurors Thursday afternoon watched the first hour of the interview with a disheveled Dominguez and the Davis detectives who wanted answers from their prime suspect. 'People lie to me every day,' Ramos told Dominguez on the interview video as Davis police Detective Matthew Muscardini watched from the witness stand. 'Take a look around this room. Be honest with yourself. Why are we here? Why are we here with you in this room?' he said. 'I'm not sure,' Dominguez said. Testimony resumes Tuesday in Woodland.
Yahoo
08-05-2025
- Yahoo
Survivor of Davis stabbing spree testifies at Carlos Dominguez trial about attack
Kimberlee Guillory initially believed she was being punched after someone slashed through her tent and attacked her with a blade. 'I just didn't think someone was stabbing me. The first time took my breath away. Then it continued,' Guillory said from the witness stand Wednesday afternoon at Carlos Reales Dominguez's murder trial in Woodland. Guillory, who was 64 at the time and newly homeless in Davis, had been sleeping in a friend's tent beside a PG&E substation on L Street. On May 1, 2023, she became the third and final victim in a weeklong stabbing spree that killed two others and left Davis on edge. Dominguez has pleaded not guilty and not guilty by reason of insanity to the stabbings two years ago that killed David Breaux, 50, and Karim Abou Najm, 20, as well as the near-fatal attack on Guillory. The trial, now in the guilt phase, is expected to last up to 10 weeks. Stabbing suspect Carlos Reales Dominguez listens to Kimberlee Guillory, who was stabbed in her in tent while living on L Street in Davis, testify in his trial while deputy public defender Daniel Hutchinson, right, takes notes on Wednesday in Yolo Superior Court in Woodland. Earlier Wednesday, jurors heard testimony from Dr. Matt Massie, the Davis physician who tried to save Najm after the college student was stabbed along a Sycamore Park bike path. Massie testified that he chased the attacker, who briefly turned to him and said, 'What do you want, man? Leave me alone.' The man's voice, Massie said, sounded like 'a scared young man,' not the monster he expected. Massie reached Najm, but his wounds were 'devastating,' and efforts to revive him were unsuccessful. Prosecutors allege Dominguez fled the park and, three days later, attacked Guillory. Stabbing victim Kimberlee Guillory uses a laser pointer, pointing to a map of the location of her tent on L Street in Davis when she was attacked, as she testifies on Wednesday during the trial of Carlos Reales Dominguez in Yolo Superior Court in Woodland. Word of the knife killings had made its way through the camps, campers who shared the strip of land along Davis' Second Street with Guillory testified. Guillory said she and a group of four others stayed close that night. She stayed awake browsing on a phone, the phone's glow illuminating the tent, as she leaned against its back wall. 'I thought I was being punched really hard in the back — at first. After a couple seconds, it hurt. He was continuing to stab me. I don't know who he was or why he was doing it,' Guillory, now 66 and living in West Sacramento, said. 'I stood up after he was gone and I saw blood start to gush out of me. I dialed my daughter's number and said, 'I've just been stabbed. She said, 'Oh, my God,' and that's when the ambulance came. I don't remember anything else until I woke up in the hospital.' Victim Kimberlee Guillory makes a downward stabbing motion, describing the knife attack that ripped open the tent where she living in Davis and sent her to the hospital, as she testifies on Wednesday during the trial of Carlos Reales Dominguez in Yolo Superior Court in Woodland. She spent several days in critical condition and testified that two campmates fought with her attacker, whom she later identified in the courtroom as Dominguez. 'I did actually see his face while they were wrestling. He looked at me while I was lying on the floor.' Yolo County District Attorney's prosecutors devoted Wednesday to testimony detailing the slayings of Breaux and Najm days apart in Davis' Central and Sycamore parks; before closing the day with Guillory's testimony. Dominguez, a former UC Davis student, was arrested three days late on May 4. Authorities say he purchased the tactical knife used in the stabbings months earlier. He was declared competent to stand trial in January after months at a state hospital. If convicted, he faces life in prison. Prosecutors decided months before the trial that they would not seek the death penalty. Testimony in the first phase continues through the week at Yolo Superior Court.
