A court-appointed physician has decided that Carlos Reales Dominguez, a former UC Davis scholar charged with killing two males and wounding a lady in a string of stabbings that shocked the quiet faculty city, is just not mentally competent to face trial for these crimes.
Yolo County Superior Court docket Decide Samuel McAdam introduced the discovering throughout a courtroom listening to Tuesday. Prosecutors within the case took subject with the discovering and requested a jury trial on the query of Dominguez’s competency, the Davis Enterprise reported. McAdam set the listening to for July 24.
“I need to apologize and say I’m responsible,” Dominguez, 21, mentioned in courtroom Tuesday earlier than his public defender, Dan Hutchinson, requested for a short recess. McAdam ordered that the confession be struck from the document.
Dominguez is charged in a collection of seemingly random stabbings carried out over a interval of days in late April and early Could. Two of the assaults occurred in native parks, casting a pall over a metropolis that celebrates its inexperienced house, youth sports activities and outside markets. Dominguez pleaded not responsible at his Could 5 arraignment.
Dominguez was first detained on Could 3. Police stopped him close to the scene of one of many killings after a number of Davis residents known as police to say he matched an outline offered by witnesses to 2 of the assaults.
The primary assault was found April 27, when authorities discovered the bloodied physique of 50-year-old David Henry Breaux, a Stanford College graduate who selected to dwell open air and infrequently spent nights in Davis’ leafy Central Park. Breaux had been stabbed to demise on a bench the place he slept.
Two days later, Karim Abou Najm, 20, a UC Davis senior and Davis Excessive Faculty graduate, was fatally stabbed in Sycamore Park as he biked dwelling from a college occasion. A neighbor heard sounds of misery and got here to Najm’s support however wasn’t in a position to save him.
Days later, a lady in her 60s was attacked as she slept at a homeless encampment close to the town’s downtown. She was alone in her tent when her assailant slashed the canvas, reached in and stabbed her repeatedly. She was hospitalized however survived.
When police detained Dominguez, they mentioned they discovered a big “hunting-style knife” in his backpack. Davis Police Chief Darren Pytel mentioned investigators spoke with Dominguez for hours earlier than arresting him for all three crimes.
After the arrest, UC Davis officers mentioned that Dominguez had been “separated” from the varsity for poor tutorial efficiency lower than two days earlier than the violence started.
Dominguez, who got here to the U.S. from El Salvador as an unaccompanied minor in 2009, was an completed scholar and athlete at Castlemont Excessive Faculty in Oakland. He graduated in 2020 and enrolled at UC Davis.
After his arrest, his father expressed shock in a short telephone interview with The Occasions: “He was so excited to go to Davis. I don’t perceive how this might occur,” the daddy mentioned.
The violence solid a chill over life in small-town Davis. Individuals have been afraid to exit at evening, and companies closed their doorways early. Neighborhood members overtly mourned the deaths of two light and well-loved residents.
After the listening to Tuesday, Abou Najm’s mom, Nadine Yehya, informed the Davis Enterprise that she “couldn’t cease myself from crying” when she heard Dominguez’s confession within the courtroom. She and her husband, Majdi Abou Najm, have devoted themselves to efforts to honor their son’s life, together with an initiative for analysis into psychological well being and higher interventions to assist individuals earlier than they commit horrible acts. On Sunday, the household attended what would have been Abou Najm’s faculty commencement ceremony.
