SAN JOSE, Calif. — On Wednesday morning in Santa Clara County Superior Court, Deputy District Attorney Kevin Smith called three prosecution witnesses, none of whom testified to incriminating eyewitness or forensic evidence against the accused. The jury trial began on July 11, 2025, and has been ongoing for 11 days.
The accused was charged with conspiracy to murder two people and attempting to murder four others in a fatal shooting that took place on Sept. 15, 2020.
A woman who survived the shooting testified for the prosecution. On the evening of Sept. 15, she attended a vigil for someone who had passed away, she said. Upon hearing gunshots—which the prosecution contends were fired by the accused—she and her friends left the vigil. She stated that she did not see who fired the shots.
The woman and her friends returned to the same place later that night to finish paying their respects, she testified. Tearing up, she said that this time, people drove by and fired a gun, hitting her five times and killing two people. Her back was to the street, so she did not see who shot her, she said.
Deputy Defense Attorney Leah Gillis elected not to cross-examine the survivor.
The prosecution also called a criminalist—a scientist who analyzes evidence in criminal matters—as an expert in gunshot residue analysis. After detailing his experience and his methods for analyzing gunshot residue, the expert said he had tested samples from two cars belonging to the accused.
In none of those samples did he find any “particles characteristic of gunshot residue,” the expert said. As a result, he could not conclude whether a gun had been fired in either car.
Although the prosecution’s burden of proof is beyond a reasonable doubt, DDA Smith proceeded to hint at the possibility that a gun could have been fired from the car despite the expert’s finding.
DDA Smith had the expert testify to how wind, water, movement by people, and various other factors can redistribute particles of gunshot residue.
If samples are taken from a car five months after the shooting and the car has been habitually used in those months—as in this case—the lack of gunshot residue is “not surprising,” the expert said. In fact, he explained that there are no gunshot residue particles found in around half the samples they test.
DDA Gillis also cross-examined the police sergeant who investigated the case. She asked the sergeant if, in reviewing the accused’s call detail records (CDRs) from Sept. 15, he had concluded that the accused had gone to work that day.
“I don’t recall the movement of his phone,” the sergeant answered.
“You don’t know where [the accused] was at nine a.m. on September 15th?” DDA Gillis asked. She emphasized that it had been five years since the offense.
“In California,” the sergeant said.
“That’s the best you can do,” DDA Gillis responded. She hammered home that the sergeant did not know whether the accused had gone to work, which car he had driven, or if he went back home from work on the day of the shooting.
DDA Gillis further revealed that although the sergeant had the resources to find alternate vehicles in the area matching the description of the car used in the shooting, he had not done so.
The sergeant explained that “the returns can be overwhelming” in such a search. DDA Gillis countered that, as a detective, the sergeant was accustomed to combing through voluminous data such as cellphone records.
The prosecution theorized that the accused had fired the shots at the vigil earlier that day, left once the police arrived, and became so enraged that he enlisted another, younger man to kill the people who died later that night.
However, DDA Gillis highlighted another theory—one that did not implicate the accused whatsoever—that the investigators had detailed in their written statement of facts.
In the alternate theory, Gillis said, the investigators had suspected another group of men who had been at the vigil of returning and committing the murders. At the time of that theory, the sergeant had been investigating the case for six months, had reviewed CDRs, and examined surveillance footage.
After writing that statement of facts, the police had uncovered no new DNA, fingerprints, confessions, eyewitness testimonies, CDRs, or text messages implicating the accused, the sergeant admitted on cross-examination.
The only new piece of evidence the sergeant recalled uncovering after writing the statement of facts was the murder weapon, which was found at the accused’s place of residence five months after the crime.
This gun had been used “with lethal intent” by a different person—not suspected of any involvement in this case—just five days after the crime, the sergeant said. He conceded that the gun was being passed around from person to person.
If it was clear the gun was being moved around, Gillis asked why the sergeant had given “so much significance” to the accused being in possession of the gun five months after the crime.
Throughout the morning trial, none of the prosecution witness testimonies provided eyewitness or forensic evidence incriminating the accused.
The trial will reconvene at 1:30 p.m. on Wednesday.
