The Shiner, Texas area dad, 23, who beat a man to death upon catching that man molesting his daughter has been cleared of all charges.
With his daughter finally safe, the father frantically called 911, begging a dispatcher to find his rural ranch and send an ambulance. "Come on! This guy is going to die on me!" the man is heard screaming on the 911 call. "I don't know what to do!"
A recording of the tape was played during a news conference Tuesday where the Lavaca County district attorney and sheriff announced that the father will not face charges.
In declining to indict the 23-year-old father in the June 9 killing of Jesus Mora Flores, a Lavaca County grand jury reached the same conclusion as investigators and many of the father's neighbors: He was authorized to use deadly force to protect his daughter.
After
a recent diary on this case
garnered (over the jump)
Authorities withheld the name of the man who was killed pending notification of next-of-kin for several days. The father caught Jesus Mora Flores -- a hired hand on the ranch to help with horses -- actually raping his daughter, according to witnesses. The 47-year-old rapist died at the scene.
a great many comments here, I thought the community deserved an update.
No evidence contradictory to the account the father gave on the day of the incident emerged; indeed, further details that came out suggested Flores had been able to injure the child more severely than original reports indicated.
Emergency crews responding to the father's 911 call found Flores' pants and underwear pulled down on his lifeless body. The girl was examined at a hospital, and Lavaca County District Attorney Heather McMinn said forensic evidence and witness accounts corroborated the father's story that his daughter was being sexually molested.
The father was never arrested, but the killing was investigated as a homicide.
Philip Hilder, a Houston criminal defense attorney and former federal prosecutor, said he would have been surprised if the grand jury had decided to indict the father. Hilder said Texas law provides several justifications for the use of deadly force, including if someone commits a sexual assault.
"The grand jury was not about to indict this father for protecting his daughter," he said.
There has been some commentary at news site accounts and by persons (NOT members of the family of the girl who was sexually molested) about how this case should have been handled. Texas Rangers assisted the Lavaca County authorities in the investigation.
She is a victim of rape -- and her whole family are victims of this deranged individual who attacked her, now. The family members will have no further comment. Local authorities, however, have more to say, and what they say suggests the father acted appropriately:
The law in Texas authorizes a person to use deadly force to prevent the commission of a sexual assault.The grand jury did the right thing in no-billing this parent for protecting his little girl. One of the members of the Shiner community puts it best, I think:
In declining to indict the 23-year-old father in the June 9 killing of Jesus Mora Flores, a Lavaca County grand jury reached the same conclusion as investigators and many of the father's neighbors: He was authorized to use deadly force to protect his daughter.
"It's sad a man had to die," said Michael James Veit, 48, who lives across the street from where the attack happened in this small community run on ranching and the Shiner beer brewery. "But I think anybody would have done that."