Judge denies more evaluations as new THC theory pushed in Davis stabbing case
Yolo County prosecutors argued Carlos Reales Dominguez’s mental state during the brutal knife attacks that killed a Davis man and a graduating UC Davis student and nearly ended the life of an unhoused woman in April and May 2023 was brought on by heavy, prolonged use of highly potent cannabis.
Prosecutors were rejected by a judge Thursday in their bid to have their office’s own doctors evaluate Dominguez’s mental state — even as they levied the new theory behind the deadly Davis stabbings that paralyzed the city more than two years ago.
Yolo Superior Court Judge Samuel T. McAdam denied the District Attorney Office’s filing, calling it “untimely” months after jurors in June failed to reach a verdict in the killings and more than a year after medical experts at trial testified to the former UC Davis student’s diagnosed schizophrenia. A scheduled second murder trial is two months away, beginning Jan. 20.
“The prosecutors picked the date. Why is that important? Because it’s been two and a half years since the attacks,” McAdam said from the bench. “The victims, witnesses and the defendant deserve timely justice. I said (in May 2023) that this is not a ‘whodunit,’ this was a case of the defendant’s state of mind. Everyone was put on notice.”
But McAdam said prosecutors will be allowed to present the new theory during trial. Prosecutors argued Thursday that Dominguez had purchased and was consuming “high THC value” cannabis — cannabis at levels of 10% THC or higher — for months and even years before the serial stabbings.
David Breaux, 50, and Karim Abou Najm, 20, were killed at Davis’ Central and Sycamore parks in April 2023. The third attack grievously wounded Kimberlee Guillory, then 64, near downtown Davis days later in May 2023.
“This is an entirely new theory for the people?” McAdam asked.
“Yes,” said David Wilson, Yolo Chief Deputy District Attorney. “All these things that were going on in his life were actually symptoms of high usage of THC.”
Wilson clarified that the theory does not exclude Dominguez’s schizophrenia diagnosis and said expert witnesses would testify about marijuana’s effect on mental health in young people.
Dominguez had been examined by no fewer than eight psychiatrists and psychologists, including his first treating doctor, a former director of Napa State Hospital.
Criminal proceedings in the Davis stabbings were suspended for a time while Dominguez was confined for treatment at Atascadero State Hospital, and he still takes psychotropic medications for the symptoms of schizophrenia, said deputy Yolo County public defender Daniel Hutchinson.
The experts testified to Dominguez’s diagnosed schizophrenia. Family, friends and a former girlfriend testified to Dominguez’s downward spiral in the months before he was expelled from UC Davis and the violence that followed. Dominguez himself testified at trial to the “shadow figures” and voices he saw and heard before the park attacks.
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