Angelo Garcia, Jr., was seven years old when he was kidnapped and stabbed to death back in 1992. Rogelio Aviles-Barroso is charged with capital murder for the boy's death, but the defense is trying to cast doubt on the credibility of a witness.
The crime happened in September of 1992 and went cold for 20 years. Garcia, Jr., was kidnapped, stabbed and left in Goose Creek Lake after his mother, Diana Garcia, was raped and stepfather, Arturo, was pistol-whipped by two drug dealers with whom they were doing business.
Obel Cruz-Garcia was one of them and was convicted last year, then sentenced to death for capital murder. He's the one who raped the mother.
Prosecutors say Aviles-Barroso is the second attacker who actually stabbed the child because Garcia, Jr., had witnessed the attack on his parents.
His mother, Diana, will testify that even though the men were wearing masks, she knows Barroso was the other attacker.
And a third man, a convict named Rudy Santana, will also testify as part of a plea deal that Barroso stabbed the boy and that it could not have been someone else.
"He heard Chico say to this defendant, 'You know what to do,' and he heard the child scream," said Harris County assistant DA Natalie Tice during opening statements. "They killed him immediately that night. They stabbed him."
"You have to believe Mrs. Garcia and Rudy beyond a reasonable doubt," countered defense attorney Charlie Brown in his opening. "It can't be 51 percent that this man is the one that they're going to accuse of killing this child and at the end of the day, I believe you will have reasonable doubt."
If convicted, Barroso faces life without parole or the death penalty.
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