Mother of 15-year-old boy fatally stabbed at Santana Row on Valentine’s Day pleads for justice
SAN JOSE — The mother of a 15-year-old boy who was stabbed to death during a Valentine’s Day date at Santana Row stood in court Friday, her voice breaking, begging a San Jose judge to deny bail for one of the five suspected gang members police accused of beating her son during the fatal altercation.
“No one is safe from him,” said the mother of David Gutierrez, who was introduced as “Jane Doe” by the prosecutor who had arranged for extra security in the courtroom.
David’s mother said she was too afraid to reveal her name in case gang members might seek her out for harassment or worse. But it didn’t prevent her — or David’s grandmother, aunts, classmates and even his girlfriend, who crouched by his side as he lay bleeding to death that night — from packing the courtroom or from protesting outside what they consider the mild treatment of those charged in the case.
In court Friday was the only adult accused in the case, 18-year-old Emanuel Sanchez-Damion, who was charged with the beating that preceded the stabbing but not the killing. Superior Court Judge Hector Ramon denied the request for bail and sent him back to jail. Three other suspects are 16 and face juvenile assault charges for the beating.
The only one charged with David’s murder is a 13-year-old boy — so young that San Jose Police Chief Paul Joseph told reporters last month the boy will likely serve little more than eight months in a youth ranch if found guilty. David’s family and friends carried signs outside the courthouse decrying that as insufficient.
“Even though they got those kids who did that to David,” his mother said in an interview, “it’s not really justice.”
David was her only child.
A sophomore at Sequoia High School in Redwood City, he had a mop of dark curly hair and was just starting to grow a fuzzy mustache. He had no connection to any gangs, police and his friends and family say.
He loved school and had great relationships with his teachers. He had lots of friends and loved recreational boxing and cooking.
“People are always giving me compliments on how sweet and polite he was and caring,” his mother said. “Everything that David did, he was very, very passionate about it. He always had a purpose. He was always really happy.”
On Valentine’s Day, because David was too young for a driver’s license, his mom and stepfather dropped him and his girlfriend off at Santana Row for their dinner date close to the movie theaters on Olsen Drive. David was wearing a red zip-up jacket that caught the eye of the five alleged gang members, who had just been caught on video at Valley Fair mall across the street a half hour earlier beating up, bloodying and stealing a shoe of an unsuspecting shopper, according to a police statement of facts.
According to security videos at Santana Row, one of them still had the shoe in his hand when they confronted David, and one of them asked why he was “wearing red so much” — the color of a rival gang.
Police say they punched him in the face and tackled him to the ground. He was in a fetal position when a security guard broke it up, according to the statement of facts. That’s when four of the five accused fled toward Winchester Boulevard. David got up and, within a minute, he and his girlfriend encountered the 13-year-old on the sidewalk near some outdoor tables.
The girlfriend, who wasn’t identified, told police that David told the boy he wanted to fight him “one-on-one,” but the boy declined, saying he already “got his hits in,” a police affidavit says. When David again said he wanted a one-on-one, the boy pulled out a folding knife and stabbed David three times in the torso, the affidavit says.
The family says the blows went straight to his heart.
The 13-year-old may make a self-defense case, but family members say doing so would be outrageous. David had just been beaten up and was unarmed, they said Friday. Defense lawyers have pushed back on the police chief’s assertion that he’ll only spend eight months at a youth ranch, contending he’ll likely spend years in juvenile detention while the case is adjudicated and that it’s unfair to compare youth offenders to adults.
Sanchez-Damion could face a maximum 20 years for felony assault charges, but Deputy District Attorney Daisy Altamore said maximum penalties are rarely imposed.
“The community’s hearts are broken over these senseless, horrific, horrible crimes,” Altamore said. “Their pain will be forever, so they rightfully want accountability and justice for the killing of their son.”
Before Judge Ramon denied the bail request, Sanchez-Damion’s defense lawyer, Renee Hessling, had argued that her client should be released before trial, that he had nothing to do with the murder and fled before the knife came out.
“He’s a young 18-year-old who ran away to be home with his mother,” Hessling said.
In the courtroom, David’s mother and grandmother shared glances.
David would never be home again.