Prosecutor: Veteran's sexual preferences led killers to his door

EDINBURG — A 30-year-old man on trial for the murder of a Korean War veteran felt pressured by teenage gang members to participate in the slaying, defense attorneys said Monday.

But prosecutors balked at the suggestion that Hazael “Ozzy” Gonzalez was anything but the ringleader behind the crime.

Their statements came on the first day of Gonzalez’s trial for the slaying of 77-year-old Miguel Cahue, who was found beaten to death in August 2008 on the floor of his McAllen trailer home.

“He took those teens, he influenced them, and he gave them a plan,” Orlando Esquivel, an Hidalgo County assistant district attorney, said of Gonzalez. “He sent them like wild dogs into that trailer and didn’t care what happened.”

Prosecutors allege a financially strapped Gonzalez recruited the teenage members of the McAllen-based SMK street gang to rob Cahue, who he had known for several months.

The two had met at a McAllen park, where Cahue often cruised for sex partners nearly one-third his age and which Gonzalez frequented regularly, Esquivel said.

Investigators believe the younger man pitched the idea for the robbery to a 14-year-old acquaintance — Wendy Gomez — in early August and that she gathered a group of friends to carry out the attack.

Gonzalez, meanwhile, allegedly set up a meeting with Cahue by telling him he had a teenage friend who wanted to shower at Cahue’s house. According to a criminal complaint filed in Gonzalez’s case, he dropped the alleged killers off at the trailer on Aug. 6, and once inside they bound the veteran, beat him senseless and made off with only a handful of home electronics worth no more than $100.

“In the end they got nothing for their efforts,” Esquivel said. “And this 30-year-old man claimed to be intimidated and have had his arm twisted by a 14-year-old girl?”

But defense attorney David Flores told jurors Monday that the genesis for the robbery plot came from Gomez, who reportedly threatened his client’s life if he did not help them.

Gonzalez tried to keep his role limited and only agreed to drive the teens to Cahue’s house and pick them up afterward, Flores said.

“It was this group of young thugs that planned the robbery,” he said.

In all, six co-defendants have been charged with various roles in Cahue’s slaying, including three juveniles who have been certified to stand trial as adults.

Last month, an Hidalgo County jury sentenced one of them — Gomez’s 19-year-old brother, Alfredo — to life in prison after a trial in which witnesses testified he held down Cahue’s legs and arms while others beat in his skull.

Gonzalez faces capital murder charges under the law of parties, which stipulates someone who knowingly participates in a killing is just as guilty as the actual murderer. If convicted, he could face up to life in prison without the possibility of parole.

Testimony in the case is scheduled to resume this morning.