It has been a violent year in Santa Cruz County, with 15 homicides so far—five more than for all of 2009. The problem facing police, however, is not just the number of murders, but the number of murders that are still unsolved. In one extreme case, police are still trying to identify the victim.
It has been a violent year in Santa Cruz County, with 15 homicides so far—five more than for all of 2009. The Santa Cruz Sentinel reports that the problem facing police, however, is not just the number of murders, but the number of murders that are still unsolved. In one extreme case, police are still trying to identify the victim.
On Sept. 9, the body of a young Latino man was found outside a farm near Watsonville. Based on the remains it was obvious that he had suffered a violent death, but police do not even know who he was, which is why it is taking them so long to solve the case. What they have released is that he was 4 feet 8 inches tall and between the ages of 18 and 25. Based on his skull and facial shape, they were even able to create a clay model of what they think the victim looked like. They are hoping that this will help to identify the victim, so that they can “backtrack” to find his killer.
This case is similar to that of Jose Pablo Galvan, whose body was found on a seldom-used trail in the Santa Cruz Mountains on March 2. Police believe that it had been there for at least a year, but using forensics, they were able to identify the victim. They are now working on solving the crime, and trying to figure out what Galvan, who was not a resident of Santa Cruz, was doing in the mountains. This has taken longer than expected, not least because of the 50 percent increase in the number of murders this year, as opposed to last year.
Another unsolved case, the killing of 19-year-old Carl Reimer, has received much more attention. Reimer was shot outside the Mission Garden apartment complex after spending an evening barbecuing with friends. It is believed that his killers were members of a gang, but apart from a description of a thin Latino man of medium height fleeing the scene, the police have not been able to catch the perpetrators and remain stumped by a lack of physical evidence. That leaves the SCPD appealing to witnesses to come forward, if only to give Reimer’s family closure.
There is more evidence in the case of Omar Alejandro Lopez Patlan, 22, who was shot in a car near the intersection of 17th Avenue and Rodriguez Street on Sept. 25. In that case, police have DNA evidence and fingerprints, but these are still being processed, and police are waiting for witnesses to step forward.
Tuesday’s election saw the passage of a utility tax, which will be used to add eight officers to the SCPD. Given the number of unsolved murders in the county and the increase in violent crimes, they are very much needed.
