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A man suspected of killing two young people in a Corona theater last week was accompanied by three friends, who told investigators they were alarmed because they believed he had brought a gun into the room. cinema and was acting so strangely that they snuck out, apparently without warning anyone. , police records obtained on Monday show.
Two of the friends then said they later saw the accused Joseph Jimenez run out of the theater and flee in his car, according to a police detective’s affidavit filed in court.
Minutes later, on the evening of July 26, police said an employee found Rylee Goodrich, 18, and Anthony Barajas, 19, fatally injured, both shot in the head.
Six people, including the two victims, attended the film at the Regal Edwards Theater.
Detectives tracked down the person who bought four more tickets for the screening – for three moviegoers and Jimenez.
All three moviegoers said they believed Jimenez was the killer.
The statement, written to obtain a search warrant for Jimenez’s house and other property and filed in Superior Court on July 29, first describes how police linked Jimenez to the fatal shootings.
Goodrich died the night of the shooting and Barajas died on Saturday. Jimenez was charged with one count of murder and one count of attempted murder; but that second count is expected to turn into murder by the time Jimenez appears in court on Thursday August 5 for his arraignment, said John Hall, spokesperson for the Riverside County District Attorney’s Office.
The two victims and Jimenez all lived in or near Corona.
A special waiting circumstance claim that has been filed makes Jimenez eligible for the death penalty if prosecutor Mike Hestrin requests that sentence and Jimenez is found guilty of the charges.
It was not clear whether the three friends’ inaction constituted a crime. None of the three were listed in county jail records on Tuesday. A message has been left with Corona Police seeking comment. Hall declined to comment on the matter as the case is “active and ongoing,” he said.
Goodrich, a 2020 Corona High graduate, and Barajas, a 2019 Mater Dei High graduate in Santa Ana, were on a date at the theater at Crossings at Corona shopping center. They were watching the 9:35 pm screening – the last of the night – of “The Forever Purge,” the fifth installment in an anthology whose central plot revolves around the suspension of all criminal laws for a period of 12 hours once. per year.
An employee who entered to clean up Theater No.15 at around 11:35 p.m. found the victims bloodied and did not know if they were alive, the statement said. Goodrich was pronounced dead at the scene and Barajas was taken to Riverside Community Hospital, where medics found several projectiles lodged in his brain. Police found three cartridge cases and a projectile in the theater.
The detective wrote that six tickets had been purchased for this performance – two by the victims and four by a second person. All four tickets were purchased from the cinema’s website, which collected the buyer’s name and address. This led the detective to an address in Corona where the buyer lived.
The detective questioned this person as well as the other two moviegoers, according to the statement, who all told him Jimenez was with them and gave this account of the night:
“Halfway through the movie Joseph left and came back with a bag that he told them had a ‘strap’ in the bag. Witnesses believed it was a handgun. Witnesses said Joseph mumbled and spoke to himself, which made them uncomfortable. Witnesses said they had to use the restroom, but left the theater, leaving Joseph behind.
“Around (11:28 pm, two of the witnesses) saw Joseph running outside the theater and running towards his vehicle. He then sped off in his vehicle at a high speed, ”the statement said. “The next day, witnesses learned of the press releases for the murder. Witnesses believed that Joseph had committed the murder.
There was no indication in the statement that Jimenez’s friends had called the police after learning of the existence of the “strap” – slang for a gun.
This news agency does not identify the witnesses because they have not been charged with a crime.
On the night of July 27, Jimenez, 20, himself dialed 911 around 9:30 p.m.
“Jimenez called the Riverside Sheriff’s Department indicating that someone was following him,” the statement read.
This “someone” turned out to be a team assembled to arrest Jimenez and execute the search warrant at his home in the 19200 block of Envoy Avenue in the county’s El Cerrito neighborhood near Corona.
“The team… circled the marked location (where) they saw Joseph screaming and brandishing a handgun. Soon after, Joseph surrendered to the deputies, ”the statement read.
Police later said they recovered a handgun of the same caliber as the casings found in the theater as well as Goodrich’s wallet.
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