An alert homeowner prevented a vehicle fire from spreading to his house Wednesday night in El Macero, according to the Davis Fire Department.

Spokeswoman Evelyn George said the resident of a home in the 44000 block of Country Club Drive parked his truck in the garage after coming home from work. When he went to the garage to retrieve some papers at about 9:40 p.m., he noticed smoke rising from the vehicle.

He managed to drive the truck out of the garage before it became fully engulfed in flames, George said. There was no extension of the fire to the residence, and no injuries were reported.

A Woodland teen faces felony drunken-driving charges following a crash Wednesday evening that injured six people north of Woodland, according to the California Highway Patrol.

Tyler James Cearley, 18, was driving a Dodge Durango that rear-ended a Ford Windstar on southbound County Road 102 north of Road 17, causing the Ford to veer to the left and collide with a Honda Accord that was attempting to pass both vehicles, CHP Officer Bryan Konvalin said.

Six people sustained minor injuries in the 6:40 p.m. crash, and four of them — including Cearley — were taken to the UC Davis Medical Center for treatment. Konvalin said Cearley showed signs of intoxication at the scene and was arrested, but released to the hospital pending his recovery.

The CHP will file a request for felony DUI charges against Cearley with the Yolo County District Attorney’s Office, Konvalin said.

Davis police are seeking three people who attempted to rob a party this weekend host of a laptop computer after threatening other guests with a knife.

Lt. Glenn Glasgow said the trio were at a party in the 200 block of Second Street when one of them was seen taking the laptop from a common area of the house. The owner of the laptop confronted and briefly detained the thief, who reportedly pulled out a pocket knife and threatened a gathering crowd before fleeing from the house empty-handed.

No injuries were reported.

Glasgow described the armed suspect as a Latino male with a shaved head, 22-26 years old, 5-foot-11 and 250 pounds, wearing black clothing. He was accompanied by a man and woman in their early 20s, also Latino and wearing black clothing. 

Anyone with information is asked to call the Davis Police Department at 530-747-5400.

A Yolo County jury found a former Davis man guilty of second-degree murder and other felonies Monday in connection with an alcohol-fueled crash in Woodland that killed one of his friends and injured two others.

Ryan Scott Baird, 23, faces a state prison sentence of up to 29 years to life as a result of the verdicts, which culminated a two-week trial in Yolo Superior Court. In addition to the murder charge, the jury convicted Baird of gross vehicular manslaughter while intoxicated and DUI causing injury and/or death.

Each of the charges carried enhancements alleging infliction of great bodily injury and the involvement of multiple victims. Sentencing is set for June 25 before Judge Janet Gaard.

The Jan. 6, 2012, crash marked Baird’s third drunken-driving incident — following DUI convictions in Sacramento County in 2009 and Yolo County in 2010 — and prompted Yolo County prosecutors to seek the second-degree murder charge because, they said, the prior matters would have heightened Baird’s awareness of the dangers of driving under the influence.

“It’s a sad case, because he he’s had so many chances and so many warnings,” Deputy District Attorney Amanda Zambor, who prosecuted the case, said after the verdicts. “I just hope that he gets the message now.”

Authorites said Baird, a 2007 graduate of Davis High School, was partying with three friends — one of whom was celebrating his 21st birthday — when they piled into Baird’s Mitsubishi Eclipse and headed south on Interstate 5 in Woodland.

Baird reportedly was taking the County Road 102 exit at a high rate of speed when his car failed to negotiate a curve in the offramp, causing the vehicle to roll several times down a grassy embankment. Three unrestrained passengers were thrown from the wreckage, including 25-year-old Robert Dale Sunderland III of Woodland, who died at the scene.

Two other passengers, Woodland residents Oscar Saeed Rodriguez Lupercio, 22, and James Dakota Lee Black, 21, were hospitalized with major injuries. Baird also was hurt in the crash, arriving at his arraignment hearing in a wheelchair.

His attorney, Richard Dudek, expressed disappointment in the jury’s verdict Monday.

“Everything about this case is very sad,” Dudek said. “I just wish I had been able to get the jurors to understand the law better. I don’t think they understood murder.”

— Reach Lauren Keene at lkeene@davisenterprise.net or 530-747-8048. Follow her on Twitter at @laurenkeene

Woodland police arrested two men Monday on suspicion of robbing a victim of his tablet computer — and in the process linking one of the suspects to a similar incident that occurred the day before.

The investigation began at about 2:40 p.m. Monday when a Placer County resident reported being the victim of a strong-arm robbery in the County Fair Mall parking lot. Sgt. Aaron Delao said the 24-year-old man had come to Woodland to sell the tablet, which he had posted for sale on Craigslist.

He told police that two men arrived at the meeting place, and one asked to see the tablet while sitting in the passenger seat of a silver Toyota Echo. At that point the driver accelerated out of the parking lot, dragging the victim a short distance as he held on to the vehicle’s door frame.

Both suspects fled, but not before the victim memorized the Toyota’s license-plate number and relayed it to 911 dispatchers, Delao said.

Police tracked down the vehicle in the 1300 block of Tyler Drive, detaining 20-year-old Oscar Omar Gonzalez, who Delao said matched the victim’s description of the driver. He was arrested on suspicion of robbery and assault with a deadly weapon.

Officers later added a theft count in connection with an iPhone theft that occurred Sunday on Cottonwood Street. Delao said a different victim identified Gonzalez as the man who arranged to purchase the phone via Craigslist, but drove away without paying for it.

Police also arrested a second suspect, 18-year-old Eduardo Orozco of Colusa County, in the 1400 block of Washington Street, on suspicion of robbery, assault with a deadly weapon and multiple outstanding warrants. Both he and Gonzalez were lodged at the Yolo County Jail.

The tablet allegedly stolen during Monday’s incident was later recovered.

Delao said anyone who may have been the victim of a similar crime is urged to call the Woodland Police Department at 530-661-7800.

— Reach Lauren Keene at lkeene@davisenterprise.net or 530-747-8048. Follow her on Twitter at @laurenkeene

The Yolo Superior Court will hold a court proceeding and formal ceremony Monday for graduates of Felony Probation Drug Court. Judge Janet Gaard will preside over the ceremony, which begins at 10:30 a.m. in Dept. 4 of the courthouse, 725 Court St. in Woodland.

Felony Probation Drug Court has been operating in Yolo County since 1999. The adult drug court is for prison-bound defendants who have been convicted of nonviolent crimes and have significant drug and alcohol addictions, offering them an opportunity to be successful in treatment instead of going to prison. The participants are under strict monitoring with comprehensive supervision.

Three men and one woman are scheduled to graduate, potentially saving taxpayers up to $720,096, based on the annual cost of $45,006.00 for incarceration as determined by the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation’s 2010-11 budget. Collectively, the graduates were subject to suspended sentences of 16 years in state prison.

All graduates have successfully completed a local intensive residential treatment program, have a minimum of 18 months of sobriety, are gainfully employed, have committed no new crimes and have satisfied all other Felony Probation Drug Court requirements.

“This successful program reflects a strong collaboration between local governmental agencies and treatment providers to make a real difference in people’s lives,” said Gaard, who presides over the drug court calendar.

Representatives from these agencies and providers will attend the ceremony to offer their congratulations to the graduates, as will several of the program’s past graduates.

“The graduates are working to become productive and responsible members of the community. Through hard work and dedication, each graduate has turned his or her life around to obtain sobriety,” added Leanna Libolt, Yolo County deputy probation officer and coordinator of the drug court program.

Several classrooms at a Woodland elementary school were evacuated Tuesday while authorities investigated a suspicious box that turned out to contain a harmless stack of papers.

Woodland police Cpl. Dave Krause said the unattended box was discovered at about 8:15 a.m. outside a classroom at Prairie Elementary School, 1444 Stetson St. School staff called police, which summoned the Yolo County Bomb Squad to the campus.

Bomb technicians X-rayed the box and, after determining that it contained papers, deemed it not to be a threat. The scene was cleared shortly thereafter.

UC Davis police are investigating the Sunday night beating of a man who is believed to have been confronted because of his sexual orientation, according to a crime alert issued Tuesday by the UCD Police Department.

The bulletin says the victim and a friend were walking in the area of Levee and Brooks roads near Putah Creek at about 8:10 p.m. Sunday when two men in a burgundy Jeep sport-utility vehicle pulled up alongside them and began yelling anti-gay slurs. They then got out of the vehicle and assaulted the victim before fleeing in the Jeep down Brooks Road.

Police are investigating the incident as a hate crime. Information regarding the victim’s injuries, and whether he has any affiliation with the university, was not available Tuesday evening.
Both suspects were described as white males in their late teens to early 20s, about 5-foot-10 and 150 pounds, with light complexions, brown eyes and short straight brown hair.

Anyone with information about this incident is asked to call campus police at 530-752-1230.

WOODLAND — The man who agreed to help an ailing Davis resident end his life is guilty of attempted murder, a Yolo County jury ruled Wednesday during its fourth day of deliberations.

But the same panel that convicted James Elron Mings declared itself hopelessly deadlocked on a special finding alleging that the crime was performed willfully, with determination and premeditation, resulting in a mistrial on the count and a vow by the Yolo County District Attorney’s Office to retry that part of the case.

For Mings, a decision on that finding means the difference between an indeterminate prison sentence of seven years to life if a jury finds the premeditation allegation true, as opposed to a determinate term of five, seven or nine years if they decide that it is not.

The attempted murder verdict marked something of a compromise in the case, with prosecutors seeking a first-degree murder conviction for the choking and gagging death of Kevin Gerard Seery, and the defense arguing for the lesser offense of attempted voluntary manslaughter. The jury rejected both first- and second-degree murder rulings.

“Although we respect the jury’s verdict, we are, of course, very disappointed,” Assistant Chief Deputy District Attorney Michael Cabral said on behalf of prosecuting attorney Martha Holzapfel.

Deputy Public Defender Dan Hutchinson, Mings’ attorney, declined to comment on the jury’s decision.

Jury foreman James Ryan said the panel cast a total of five votes on the premeditation issue, coming as close as 10-2 in favor of finding the allegation true before deciding they could go no further. At one point Wednesday, the jury sent Judge Timothy Fall a note requesting additional instruction on the legal meaning of the word “deliberately.”

“The whole downfall of the special finding was just the definition,” said Ryan, a Woodland resident. Two jurors insisted Mings hadn’t thought his actions through, “and we couldn’t budge them after four hours of (deliberating) only that subject.”

Several other jurors told Hutchinson that while they believed Mings should serve some time in prison, it shouldn’t be a lengthy sentence, as they believe Mings is unlikely to harm anyone else.

Mings was arrested on the night of Oct. 1, 2011, when he walked into the Davis Police Department and confessed to choking the 42-year-old Seery earlier that day at the College Square Apartments on J Street, then stuffing gauze into his mouth in an attempt to block his airway.

Seery suffered from multiple ailments, including diabetes, pancreatitis and hepatitis, and asked Mings to help him end his life just days after befriending him, Mings told a police detective at the time. Holzapfel argued at trial that Mings had sufficient opportunity to weigh the consequences of his actions before deciding to hasten Seery’s death.

But Hutchinson offered a different theory, claiming Mings only managed to render Seery unconscious, and that it was a third person in Seery’s apartment — a homeless man named Thomas McDermott — who fatally gagged Seery with antibacterial wipes and part of a tube sock while Mings was in another room.

Hutchinson also contended that McDermott and Seery colluded to provoke Mings into the assisted suicide by appealing to his emotions and causing him to act in a state of passion.

Mings testified last week that he came to that realization after learning that the sock and wipes had been pulled from deep within Seery’s throat during the dead man’s autopsy. He said he was unaware that anything but gauze had been placed into Seery’s mouth.

Hutchinson said McDermott told others about the sock before the autopsy had even occurred, one of several slip-ups he said were overlooked by Davis police.

“I believe I was set up,” Mings said during his two days on the witness stand.

“We all believe (McDermott) had a role” in Seery’s death, said Ryan, the jury foreman. But because he never appeared as a witness during the two-week trial, “he was the invisible presence in the background.”

The case is due back in court Wednesday, when Holzapfel is slated to confirm whether her office will retry Mings on the premeditation finding. Mings remains in custody at the Yolo County Jail.

— Reach Lauren Keene at lkeene@davisenterprise.net or 530-747-8048. Follow her on Twitter at @laurenkeene

Elsa Ruiz-Duran was startled awake early Tuesday morning by a loud explosion just outside her Old East Davis home.

Jumping quickly out of bed, she slipped on some flip-flops, grabbed her keys and headed for the door to see what had caused the noise, only to be greeted by yet a second loud and “terrifying” blast.

Once outside, she and several of her neighbors discovered that two PG&E transformers had exploded on the corner of Fifth and K streets, one below ground and one above, setting the overhead power line hanging above the neighborhood on fire.

According to the Fire Department, the two transformers and a utility pole also caught fire.

“Sparks were going up into the sky and (fire was) traveling across the (power) line,” Ruiz-Duran recalled Thursday. (PG&E) crew members called it a fireball.”

Davis firefighters, in addition to other emergency responders, were on the scene shortly after the explosions occurred just before 1 a.m. to monitor the situation until PG&E crews showed up. When the firefighters arrived at the 400 block of K Street, they discovered the two transformers were still ablaze.

“(The captain decided to) let the fires burn themselves out because there wasn’t a threat to anything” and because there was no risk of the fire spreading, according to Division Chief Bruce Fry. “The crew alerted PG&E and waited on scene until they arrived.”

PG&E crew members arrived soon after to fix the two transformers that had exploded and the other damaged equipment. The incident, meanwhile, left 3,561 residents without power for several hours.

“Everybody was terrified,” Ruiz-Duran added about the initial explosions and the fires.

That night, a PG&E worker told Ruiz-Duran that the explosions occurred due to the age of the equipment, which may have been installed as early as the 1970s.

However, PG&E officials say they actually haven’t yet identified what caused the explosions.

“I can’t speculate on that,” PG&E spokesman Paul Moreno said in response to the explanation given by Ruiz-Duran. “(The) ultimate cause has not been determined, it’s still under investigation.”

Moreno added that there could be many reasons why the equipment failed, such as adverse weather conditions, vehicle contact or even animal contact. Moreno said he didn’t know when the cause of the explosions would be determined.

To prevent malfunctions, PG&E crews perform routine maintenance and testing of all electrical equipment, Moreno said. However, PG&E officials were not able to readily say how often those inspections take place.

Fry, meanwhile, said the Fire Department’s protocol for handling electrical fires varies from case to case.

“Each scenario is different, so the basic response is to establish the parameters of the size of the incident and advise the residents,” sometimes instructing them to stay indoors until the situation has been resolved, he said. Fry added that electrical wire systems are designed to trip breakers when such incidents occur to halt the fire’s progression.

“At some point it’s going trip the breaker and isolate the source of the power,” thus preventing a fire from spreading down an entire block, Fry said. “You should not have a continuation of fire on a line.”

Rob Cain, the city’s urban forest manager, explained that PG&E’s vegetation management division is responsible for ensuring that there is a safe distance between power lines and trees to prevent any dangerous contact. He added that if residents have concerns about power lines near their homes, they should call PG&E directly.

Tuesday’s incident also isn’t the first in Davis in recent years where residents have questioned the utility and the age of its equipment.

In 2011, a dramatic number of gas leaks were discovered in the Stonegate subdivision in West Davis, prompting months of discourse between PG&E officials and residents over the safety of the gas lines running underneath their neighborhood.

PG&E admitted that the type of pipe transporting the gas, which in some places was installed several decades ago, was susceptible to brittleness and cracking. The utility later determined that the caps on the service line diversion points, called “service tees” — made from the same Aldyl-A pipe — were responsible for most of the 81 leaks they discovered.

The utility eventually replaced about 2,000 feet of transmission and service lines underneath the area in Stonegate that experienced the highest concentration of leaks.

— Enterprise staff writer Lauren Keene contributed to this story; reach her at lkeene@davisenterprise.net. Reach Tom Sakash at tsakash@davisenterprise.net or 530-747-8057. Follow him on Twitter at @TomSakash

Woodland police reported busting two gambling facilities Thursday during a joint operation with the California Department of Justice and the Yolo County High-Tech Task Force.

Sgt. Brett Hancock said search warrants were served at 3 p.m. at 1810 E. Main St. and 825 East St. in Woodland, with officers seizing computers and cash at both locations.

“Both sites were secured by officers without incident,” Hancock said in a brief news release announcing the operation. “There were not many patrons at the time, but one of them was arrested for possession of a controlled substance.”

No other arrests were reported, though Hancock said both facilities remain under investigation.

Anyone with information about these or other gambling locations in the city is asked to call the Woodland Police Department at 530-661-7800.

A rural Yolo County intersection was shut down for several hours Wednesday after two big rigs collided, spilling loads of sand and hot asphalt onto the roadway.

California Highway Patrol Officer Bryan Konvalin said the spills occurred shortly before 11:30 a.m. as the two rigs veered to avoid colliding at the T-intersection of County Roads 93 and 27. The maneuvers caused one of the rigs to strike the rear trailer of the other, spilling the trailer’s load of sand.

The first rig then ran off the north edge of County Road 27, spilling its load of asphalt, Konvalin said. Both spills were contained to the roadway.

One driver went to the UC Davis Medical Center in Sacramento with complaints of pain, Konvalin said. The cleanup process resulted in a three-hour closure of the intersection.

A Davis resident drove her car into the front of the Senior Center, 646 A St., Friday, partially smashing through the cement exterior and into a bathroom on the other side of the wall, springing a leak that flooded part of the building.

Just after 10 a.m., Barbara Perkes arrived to the center to deliver Meals On Wheels in her white Nissan Altima when she apparently lost control of the vehicle, maneuvering between two pillars in the front of the center and barreling into the front of the building.

Perkes crumpled the front right side of her car. The base of the wall of the center from the outside was smashed into the bathroom by several feet.

“(The car) broke off a pipe and there was significant damage to the east side of the complex with a large amount of water into the building,” said Division Chief Scott Kinney.

No one was hurt, including Perkes.

Maria Lucchesi, a senior center staff member who was on the scene the time of the incident, said that the majority of the programs scheduled for the multipurpose room on the east side of the building were cancelled for the day.

— Reach Tom Sakash at tsakash@davisenterprise.net or 530-747-8057. Follow him on Twitter at @TomSakash

Gang activity may have played a role in both a carjacking and a shooting that occurred in Woodland late last week, according to police.

Three people were arrested in connection with the carjacking, which occurred at about 10:30 p.m. Thursday near Ferns Park on West Southwood Drive. The victim reported being assaulted by three males who took his cell phone, car keys and 1994 Toyota, Sgt. Heath Parsons said.

The victim suffered bruises and scrapes but did not require medical aid.

Officers spotted the car about three hours later and arrested two males and a female who were inside. Sacramento resident Dominick Arismendez, 18, was lodged at the Yolo County Jail on suspicion of robbery, carjacking, conspiracy and criminal street-gang activity. His alleged accomplices, both minors, were taken to Juvenile Hall on similar charges, Parsons said.

Meanwhile, members of the Yolo County Gang Task Force have been asked to assist with the investigation into a shooting that occurred Saturday night outside a Sixth Street apartment complex, Woodland police said.

No one was injured in the 9 p.m. shooting, in which a white pickup truck and a small silver sedan pulled up outside the Woodland Gardens Apartments in the 1700 block of Sixth Street. A Latino male was seen emerging from one of the vehicles and shooting at another man before fleeing the scene in the silver car, Sgt. Aaron Delao said.

The victim, who escaped through a neighboring apartment complex, later called relatives to report he had been shot at but not injured, Delao said. Other residents of the apartment complex also escaped injury.

Anyone with information about either of these incidents is asked to call the Woodland Police Department at 530-666-2411.

Woodland police are investigating weekend vandalism that damaged the Holy Rosary Community Center, 575 California St.Officers were alerted at 5 a.m. Monday to the vandalism, which according to Sgt. Darren Imus included several areas of gang graffiti and a threat to kill law enforcement officers. The incident is being investigated as a felony crime.

Anyone with information about the vandalism is asked to call the Woodland Police Department at 530-666-2411. Callers may remain anonymous.

Yolo County coroner’s officials are investigating the weekend death of a jail inmate.

Todd Alexander Phillips, 29, of West Sacramento, died Saturday at Woodland Memorial Hospital, where he was taken after a correctional officer found him “agitated and upset” in his jail cell shortly before 1 p.m., sheriff’s Lt. Dale Johnson said in a news release issued Monday.

“Phillips was lying on the side of his bed having labored breathing,” Johnson said. Officers placed Phillips in restraints “for safety reasons” while medical staff responded to the cell. He was then transported to the hospital, where efforts to revive him were unsuccessful.

Phillips did not have a cellmate, Johnson said.

An autopsy was conducted Monday, but rulings on Phillips’ cause and manner of death have not been determined pending toxicology and other testing procedures.

Phillips had been in jail custody since April 12, when he was arrested by West Sacramento police on various felony and misdemeanor charges, according to Johnson. He was due back in court June 11 for a pretrial hearing.

WOODLAND — Anti-gay slurs often are used to challenge a person’s masculinity, and do not necessarily demonstrate bias against homosexuals, a linguistics expert testified Monday in Yolo Superior Court.

William Eggington, chair of the linguistics department at Brigham Young University, was called as a defense witness for Clayton Daniel Garzon, the 20-year-old Davis resident accused of brutally beating a gay man in what authorities have classified as a hate crime.

Judge David Rosenberg is expected to rule today whether there is sufficient evidence for Garzon to stand trial for the March 10 beating of Lawrence “Mikey” Partida outside his cousin’s I Street home, where family and friends had gathered to celebrate Partida’s 32nd birthday.

Garzon has pleaded not guilty to the charges against him, which include felony counts of assault, battery and criminal threats, all of which carry hate-crime enhancements that, if proven, could increase the penalties in the case.

Eggington took the witness stand during the second day of Garzon’s preliminary hearing. He testified that language is “incredibly nuanced,” with a single word having various meanings when used in different social contexts.

Research shows “there’s a wide range of usage attached to the words ‘fag’ and ‘faggot,’ ” Eggington said. He likened the term to “sissy” and “girlie man” — “loaded terms that challenge masculinity.”

In other settings, the word has been used as a put-down, synonymous with “stupid” or “idiot,” Eggington said.

Witnesses have testified that Garzon hurled the slur several times at Partida as he and his cousin Vanessa Turner left another cousin’s I Street home during the early hours of March 10. Turner previously testified that Garzon became angry when she and Partida shrugged off Garzon’s attempts to talk to her.

After the beating, Garzon allegedly pounded on the front door of the I Street house and said, “Your faggot cousin was talking sh–. I had to f— him up,” Channon Cooper, who also lives at the house, testified under questioning by Chief Deputy District Attorney Jonathan Raven.

Garzon’s attorney, Linda Parisi, has contended her client used the slurs in the context of youthful “slang” and not as a reference to Partida’s sexual orientation. She maintains Garzon was raised in a tolerant household that included positive relationships with a gay uncle, neighbor and friend.

Monday’s hearing also shed additional light on the injuries Garzon suffered to his face on the night of the beating. Parisi displayed a photo of her injured client several times during the hearing’s first day on May 10, showing several scrapes and gashes to his face.

Josh Lawson, a bouncer at G Street WunderBar, said he was walking home from work at about 3:45 that morning when he heard a commotion from outside Partida’s cousin’s home. He said he walked up to discover Partida, whom he knew, “bleeding from every hole in his head.”

As Lawson dialed 911, Garzon — who was being detained by Cooper — hopped the front-yard fence and ran toward his house across the street, Lawson recalled. As he ran toward a stairway at the rear of the house, Garzon tripped over a bender board in his front yard and fell onto his face.

Lawson said he caught up to Garzon before he was able to enter his home, twice compressing his neck and causing him to lose consciousness because he feared Garzon would attack him, he said.

Lawson also testified he had shone a flashlight into Garzon’s face before the pursuit and saw no injuries.

Partida, who was hospitalized for nearly two weeks following the assault, suffered fractures to his skull and rib cage during the beating,Davis police Detective John Evans testified. He also underwent surgery to remove from his right eye socket a nearly two-inch-long piece of wood — possibly from being impaled on a fence post during his assault — which Raven displayed in court in a plastic evidence bag.

Evans said Partida recalled that Garzon had followed him and his cousin around the block after they left the party, and he that he was attacked when he went back for a set of forgotten keys.

Under cross-examination by Parisi, Evans said Partida initially identified his assailant as someone named “Nick,” and that he failed to identify Garzon out of a photo lineup shown to him by police.

The preliminary hearing concludes today with testimony from a final defense witness before Rosenberg issues his ruling.

Garzon reportedly waived his right to a preliminary hearing last week in another pending assault case in Solano County, stemming from a September 2012 stabbing at a Dixon house party. His arraignment in that case is set for May 31.

— Reach Lauren Keene at lkeene@davisenterprise.net or 530-747-8048. Follow her on Twitter at @laurenkeene

WOODLAND — A Yolo Superior Court judge has upheld all charges filed against a Davis resident in connection with the March 10 beating of a gay man, including hate-crime allegations the defendant’s attorney tried to disprove in court this week.

Clayton Daniel Garzon, 20, is due back in court June 7 for arraignment on felony counts of assault, battery and criminal threats, which Judge David Rosenberg said were backed by a sufficient amount of evidence to move the case forward to trial.

“When considering all the evidence in this case, the court concludes … that the crimes committed in this case were based and motivated at least in part on bias against the sexual orientation of the victim,” Rosenberg said during his ruling Tuesday, the final day of Garzon’s preliminary hearing.

Whether that evidence is enough for a conviction, Rosenberg added, ultimately will be for a jury to decide.

His decision came as welcome news to assault victim Lawrence “Mikey” Partida of Davis, who clasped hands with relatives and other supporters as he left the Woodland courtroom.

“The hate crime (enhancement) was very important to me, because it is a he-said, she-said thing,” Partida, 32, said in an interview with reporters. “But I know what happened, and he knows what happened.”

Witnesses who testified during the preliminary hearing said Garzon repeatedly called Partida “fag” and “faggot” as the victim and his cousin Vanessa Turner left a party celebrating Partida’s birthday on I Street, across the street from the Garzon family home. Partida was attacked when he went back for a forgotten set of keys.

The assault left him hospitalized for nearly two weeks with a fractured skull, bleeding to his brain and other serious injuries, including a nearly two-inch-long piece of fence post lodged near his right eye that required surgery to remove.

Chief Deputy District Attorney Jonathan Raven contended during his closing remarks Tuesday that Garzon became enraged when Partida thwarted his attempts to talk to Turner, whom Garzon had shown an interest in at the house party.

“Make no mistake — this was not simply a fight between two young men,” Raven said. He alleged that Garzon “snapped” when his masculinity was challenged that night, “not just by another man, but a gay man.”

Defense attorney Linda Parisi, meanwhile, argued there was no proof that her client harbors bias against homosexuals or even had any knowledge of Partida’s sexual orientation.

Her witnesses this week included Garzon’s openly gay uncle, who testified that his nephew has always been accepting and even “protective” of him, as well as a linguistics expert from Brigham Young University who said the word “fag” is more often used to challenge masculinity than to express anti-gay sentiments.

“Obviously I’m very disappointed by the ruling,” Parisi told reporters later. “Mr. Garzon has lived a life that has embraced diversity in all areas, and specifically including one’s sexual orientation.”

Garzon, who has pleaded not guilty to the criminal charges, remains free on $520,000 bail while his case is pending.

— Reach Lauren Keene at lkeene@davisenterprise.net or 530-747-8048. Follow her on Twitter at @laurenkeene

For the second time this month, Woodland police are investigating an assault on a homeless man behind a vacant business.

Sgt. Steve Sexton said officers were dispatched shortly after 11 p.m. Wednesday to the former State Theater building on Main Street to investigate reports of “subjects fighting with knives and baseball bats.”

A 57-year-old man was found later at the nearby Hotel Woodland with non-life-threatening injuries to his left arm and head, Sexton said. He was transported to Woodland Memorial Hospital for treatment.

Sexton said police are seeking suspect named Marcus, described as an African-American male, about 50 years old. Anyone with information about his whereabouts is asked to call the Woodland Police Department at 530-661-7800.

Police also continue to investigate the May 4 stabbing of a 32-year-old homeless man that occurred behind a shuttered restaurant in the 900 block of Court Street. The suspects in that incident were described as two Latino heavyset males.