New overseas forensics could help solve local murder

Bond might hold the key to solving one of Porterville’s murder mysteries.

He is not the legendary 007, but Dr. John Bond, an honorary research fellow at England’s University of Leicester Forensic Research Centre, is becoming quite well-known in his own right.

The Porterville Police Department’s two cold case investigators believe Bond might have the skills to find fingerprints that may have been deposited on the small bullet shell casings found in 1995 at the murder scene of Hugo Alvarez Vazquez. They learned about Bond’s revolutionary technique — which relies on sweat from fingerprints corroding metal — during a cold case conference last week at the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center in San Diego.

“The technology from when we first started is light years ahead now,” investigator John Benas said. “We might be able to get some new information.”

At about midnight on Feb. 24, 1995, Vazquez was shot to death behind the wheel of his newly purchased Honda. The 22-year-old was on his way home from a late night shift at the WalMart Distribution Center when someone pulled out a small caliber handgun and shot him on South Main Street.

“He was a young man, just coming of age,” Benas said. “There is no reason to believe he was involved in gangs, but that does not mean that the suspect wasn’t.”

Upon being shot, Vazquez’s car puttered to a stop just before reaching the intersection at Orange Avenue. But it was late at night, and by the time the nearest driver came upon the scene, it was too late.

Vazquez was dead and whoever killed him was nowhere in sight.

“A citizen heard gunshots but he didn’t see anything,” investigator Ernie Garay said. “There would have been no traffic, and the gunshot sounds would’ve echoed a long way. The citizen was on Plano Street when he heard the shots, but when he drove up next to Hugo’s car he could already see, without getting out, what had happened. Together with another citizen, they tried to help Hugo. They went to a corner store and used a public phone to call 9-1-1.”

When police first arrived at the scene they found several shell casings.

Police Chief Chuck McMillan said it is his responsibility to ensure the cold case investigators — also known within the department as the ‘space cowboys’ — have the funding to get those shell casings off to Bond.

“Whatever we can to do resolve this for the family, to bring justice to the case,” he said. “I believe that all of these [cold] cases are solvable.”

According to Benas, the family had moved to Porterville to make a better life for their family, and Vazquez was doing his part. He was working two jobs, and was well liked-by his fellow employees and his supervisors at both the former Rick and Steve’s 50’s Diner and the distribution center.

“They were doing everything right,” Benas said.

The investigators have checked nearby businesses for video surveillance tapes, kept in touch with family members and interviewed countless people tied to Vazquez. None of their leads have led them directly to a suspect.

Finding fingerprints — even if they are 15 years old — might be their best chance yet.

Contact Jenna Chandler at 784-5000, Ext. 1050, or jchandler@portervillerecorder.com.