A retrial of a San Pedro man accused of gunning down an off-duty Monterey Park police officer in Downey for refusing to give up his Dodge Charger got started Monday, May 11, as attorneys gave opening statements in Norwalk Superior Court.
Carlos Daniel Delcid, now 24, faces single counts of murder, shooting at an inhabited vehicle, and possession of a firearm by a felon related to the Aug. 2, 2022, shooting of Gardiel Solorio, 26, outside a LA Fitness gym at the Downey Landing shopping center.
He also faces a count of second-degree robbery for a separate incident in Long Beach in April 2022.
A judge declared Delcid’s first trial in January a mistrial. All sides had agreed that Solorio’s status as a police officer would not be told to the jury because it was not an element of the crime. But a witness had briefly mentioned that during testimony, and a jailhouse recording played for the jury referenced “off-duty” — prompting Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Joseph R. Porras to figure at least one jury member could have connected the dots.
Prosecutors say much of the evidence against Delcid will come from video and from the mouths of the defendant and his crime partners through recorded jailhouse conversations with officers posing as inmates.
A dashcam of a nearby Lyft driver’s car captured portions of what led up to the shooting, and the aftermath was on the gym’s surveillance cameras.
Delcid and two other men in a black Honda Accord, prosecutors allege, were looking for a car to steal and spotted Solorio’s black 2019 Dodge Charger. After they got stuck behind a work truck, Solorio went around both vehicles and the Accord followed.
After Solorio parked, the Accord stopped nearby, and Delcid got out wearing a gray hoodie and a black mask, prosecutors said. He walked up to Solorio’s car with a gun and demanded it, but when Solorio instead put the car in reverse, Delcid allegedly fired five shots at him through the driver’s window — three quickly killing the officer, a medical examiner determined.
The shooter returned to the sedan, which drove away.
The dashcam captured the Accord’s license plate and detectives learned it was registered to a home in Long Beach, prosecutors said. They were waiting when the car returned and two of the three suspects, Delcid and then-17-year-old Christopher Sanchez, were arrested that night. Other evidence, including a gray sweatshirt and a black mask, was also found.
As the Accord fled, Solorio’s Charger slowly reversed until it backed into another vehicle in the parking lot, prosecutors said. A witness pulled Solorio from the car and attempted CPR before first responders arrived.
The third suspect, Gerardo Magallanes, was arrested days later, prosecutors said. In jail, he allegedly told an undercover officer that the three in the Accord were looking for a car to steal to “go ride.”
Delcid’s attorney, Rick Sternfeld, had asked the jury in Delcid’s first trial to take in all the evidence before making a decision and said that the video would not tell the whole story. He told the panel a witness provided a suspect description that did not fit Delcid’s and that the witness believed the shooting stemmed from a road-rage incident.
Magallanes pleaded no contest to voluntary manslaughter and was sentenced to 24 years in state prison. Sanchez, who prosecutors identified as the driver of the Accord, also pleaded no contest to voluntary manslaughter and was sentenced to 11 years.
Inmate records showed Delcid had been arrested three other times since December 2021.
In March 2022, he pleaded no contest to burglary and inflicting injury on a spouse or cohabitant and was sentenced to 180 days in jail and four years of probation, according to court records.Charges of assault with a deadly weapon, false imprisonment and dissuading a witness were dropped as a result of the plea deal, court records show.