Global Courant 2023-05-06 07:58:27
DAVIS, California –
Clad in an anti-suicide vest, eyes downcast, the former UC Davis student pleaded not guilty Friday to two counts of murder and one count of attempted murder in a spate of vicious stabbings that terrorized this leafy college town over the past week.
Carlos Reales Dominguez, who was “divorced” from UC Davis for poor academic performance less than two days before the violence began, appeared behind glass in Yolo Superior Court, wearing a vest designed to protect him from hurting himself and to prevent others from hurting him. He was chained at the waist, his arms thin and bare.
The indictment documents listed his age as 20, a year younger than the age Davis police gave when announcing his arrest Thursday.
Dominguez spoke to the court only briefly to indicate that he was waiving his right to a speedy preliminary hearing. Based on the allegations and an allegation of special circumstances, prosecutors could seek the death penalty in the case. Dominguez remains free on bail at the Yolo County Jail.
Several of Dominguez’s family members sat in the courtroom near where he was behind glass. They refused to talk to reporters and quickly left for their car when the hearing was over.
In an interview Thursday, Dominguez’s father expressed utter dismay and shock at his son’s arrest, describing Dominguez as an accomplished student and athlete at Castlemont High School in Oakland, where he graduated in 2020.
“This is inexplicable to me,” he told The Times, adding that he was not familiar with UC Davis had his son disqualified for academic strife last week. “He was so excited to go to Davis. I don’t understand how this could have happened.”
Born in El Salvador, Dominguez entered the country in April 2009 as an unaccompanied minor, according to an immigration and customs officer. He was handed over to a relative and his immigration case was administratively closed in April 2012.
This week, the agency placed an arrestee to take Dominguez into custody, “should he be released from local custody,” the official said.
Dominguez is charged with a series of apparently random stabbings that left two men dead and a homeless woman seriously injured. Two of the attacks took place in local parks, casting a shadow over a city that celebrates with well-used bike paths, youth sports and lots of greenery. He was detained by police Wednesday afternoon after several Davis residents called police to say he matched the description given by witnesses to two of the attacks.
The investigation began April 27, after authorities found the bloodied body of David Henry Breaux, 50, a Stanford University graduate who slept in Davis’s Central Park and was known in town for his gentle conversion of the need for compassion. Breaux had been stabbed to death on the couch where he often slept. There were no witnesses to that attack.
Two days later, Karim Abou Najm, 20, a UC Davis graduating student who had recently posted on social media about his joy in finding a job as a software engineer, was fatally stabbed in Sycamore Park as he cycled home from a college event. A neighbor who responded to the crime scene after hearing noises of fear described the attacker as a young man with curly hair and a thin build who fled on Najm’s bicycle.
Monday night, a woman in her 60s was attacked while sleeping in a homeless camp on 2nd and L streets near the center of town. She was alone in her tent when a person cut the canvas, reached in and stabbed her repeatedly. The assailant ran away when her screams called for help from fellow campers. She was taken to UC Davis Medical Center where she was recovering from surgery.
On Wednesday, Dominguez was spotted walking through a park near the site where Najm was killed on April 29, wearing dark clothing — black sweatshirt and black sweatpants with white stripe — that matched the description of witnesses to the third attack . With wavy, shoulder-length hair and a slim build, Dominguez’s appearance also matched witnesses’ descriptions.
Police arrested Dominguez and said they found a large “hunting knife” in his backpack. The weapon matched one used in the attack on Breaux, according to police. Davis police chief Darren Pytel said investigators spoke with Dominguez for hours before arresting him for all three crimes. Pytel described his demeanor as “reserved” but declined to disclose details of the conversation.
Relatives of the victims are reeling. Maria Breaux, David’s older sister, described her brother as someone who “just had this kindness in him and always has.”
He moved to Davis around 2010, she said, because he had a friend nearby and felt safe in Davis’ laid-back atmosphere. Over the years, he became a well-known figure in the town, known as the “Compassion Guy” for his habit of glorifying people to embody a spirit of humanity and forgiveness. In 2013, Breaux partnered with the city to create a ceramic tile bank that celebrated the value of compassion. He interviewed visitors to the bank about their views on kindness and empathy, as part of a weekly YouTube video series.
“There he created a community and influenced thousands and thousands of people,” his sister said in a tearful interview.
The stabbings sent a chill through Davis, as frightened residents bowed down. The city’s famed bike lanes went quiet, cafes closed early, and UC Davis moved evening classes online. Parents who normally let their children go to school on foot or by bicycle suddenly organized carpool campaigns.
As a sign of how close-knit the community is, Yolo Superior Court Judge Dan Wolk, a former mayor of Davis, opened Friday’s indictment by revealing that he, too, was touched by the crime.
He and his wife live about half a mile from Sycamore Park, where Najm was killed, he said. And on the night of the fatal stabbing, about 40 minutes before, his wife was walking the family’s dogs and saw someone who “may or may not match the suspect’s description.”
She later reported the sighting to the police, Wolk told the courtroom, but the officers did not follow up.
Hours after Dominguez was charged, hundreds of Najm’s relatives and friends gathered in a reception room on the UC Davis campus to celebrate his life.
Najm was born in Lebanon and moved to Davis with his family in 2018 after his father, a soil scientist, became a professor at UC Davis. It took Najm six weeks to graduate early from UC Davis with a degree in computer science.
“We lost our son in the most tragic way,” his mother, Nadine Abou Najm, told a roomful of sobbing friends and family. But, she added, “I will focus on the goodness of humanity and the community.”
In Arabic, she said, Karim means “generous,” and her son was full of generosity. That was something that became clear to her in the days after his murder, since his parents have heard so many stories about the ways he reached out to people.
Speaker after speaker spoke of a young man who was exuberant and kind. And also so competitive that he was known to cheat at online chess. He was impatient to advance his research, his mentor, Lee Miller, told the audience, and excited about developing a better hearing aid. He called his best friend, Aman Ganapathy, every day and was not afraid to say that he loved him. He had an inordinate sense of fashion, some said, but undeniable taste in coffee.
His father, Majdi Abou Najm, said the family teamed up with UC Davis to provide a research award for students so that his son’s inquiring mind could live on. The fund has already received over $87,000 in donations from over 700 people.
His father also asked mourners to remember their son in another way: by telling the people in their lives that they loved them. He paused the service so that everyone present could call quickly.
Najm’s mother called for the need to do more to tackle mental illness. Her son, she noted, was a good listener.
“Mental health is a national crisis,” she said. “And we cannot turn our backs (if we want to understand) what turns people into monsters. If you see someone struggling, do something.”
