Like “tropical flavored Skittles” is my favorite new way for police to describe a suspect’s shoes.
When I was a kid, you might throw eggs or toilet paper at the house of someone you didn’t like. Luis A. Chavez Grana decided shooting at the house was better, so that’s what he did. ShotSpotter heard it (23 rounds, it counted) and police responded.
By the time police arrived, Luis had fled. So too had the occupants of the residence, uninjured thankfully. But the subsequent investigation was not difficult. Idiot that he is, Luis had dropped his wallet with his ID at the crime scene. And surveillance cameras at the house recorded him in his bright and distinctive clothing.
An officer went to the house of one of the victims, a young woman who was visiting the residence at the time it was shot up, but who left before the cops arrived. She had been visiting the man who owned the house. He himself was gone to the store when the shooting happened and missed all the excitement.
The woman was not home when police got to her house. But Luis was! The woman was his wife and she hadn’t been home for two days. (Now you see why he shot up the other man’s house.)
At the time the officer spoke to Luis, he didn’t yet know Luis was the shooter. He just thought he was the husband of the woman he was trying to locate. But he did notice Luis was wearing shoes that the officer later described as being brightly colored like “tropical flavored Skittles.”
Luis went back inside after speaking to the officer. But Luis, idiot that he is, immediately went out back and started tossing his clothes and shoes over the fence toward the canal. The cop hadn’t left yet and saw this; he pretty quickly figured out Luis was the shooter. Police fished the shoes from the canal and arrested Luis.
Luis was convicted of assault with a firearm for shooting into an occupied dwelling. That the dwelling was “occupied” at the time he shot at it is what supported a conviction for assault. Luis appealed, arguing there was insufficient evidence to prove that he knew the residence was occupied.
Yesterday the California Court of Appeal upheld the conviction. It held, in essence, “Nice try, but you knew. Your wife’s car was parked out front.” He stays convicted.
An idiot and his ridiculous shoes.
You can read the opinion here.