Dozens of people packed a San Martin courtroom Friday morning to
see a suspected killer enter his plea – and dozens filed back out
minutes later, when the case was deferred yet again.
San Martin – Dozens of people packed a San Martin courtroom Friday morning to see a suspected killer enter his plea – and dozens filed back out minutes later, when the case was deferred yet again.
Friday, attorneys asked to continue David Vincent Reyes’ case until April, pending their receipt of a county coroner’s report. Police say Reyes, 40, confessed to killing his ex-girlfriend Franca Barsi, a former Gilroy Garlic Queen, Tuesday, Sept. 13 after an argument at her Westwood Drive condominium. Reyes was apprehended a day later, following an hour-long car chase that bounced from San Jose to Gilroy and back.
His plea has been delayed four times since Oct. 20, when he was first scheduled to appear in court.
The case has riveted Gilroyans who knew Barsi as a young woman, when she snagged the honor of Garlic Queen for her vivacity and remarkable array of activities. Her death left her young son Andrew motherless, and her mother Mara Perez bereft.
Friends described Barsi and Reyes’ relationship as rocky, splotched with abuse. Reyes has been previously convicted of assault with intent to commit rape and has been arrested multiple times for battering women and abusing drugs.
He appeared on the Dispatch’s Most Wanted List in 2006, after failing to register as a sex offender and committing armed robbery at Rock Zone, formerly First Street piercing shop.
At each of his nearly-monthly court appearances, Reyes’ family members have crowded in for a brief look at him, sometimes eliciting a grin or a wink from the prisoner. Barsi’s family and friends fill the opposite site of the courtroom, occasionally rubbing shoulders with Reyes’ family as they walk in. A Sheriff’s bailiff issued a stern warning to courtroom visitors today, stating that communicating with a prisoner – even non-verbally – is a misdemeanor.
Reyes is scheduled to next appear in court 9am April 20.
