Chapter 21: Ortiz is off streets, but tales of brutality keep emerging

A liberal dose

March 06, 2008

This series contains explicit language and graphic descriptions of violence.

Editor's note: To Catch a Killer is the true story of killer Andy James Ortiz, his young victims, and the Fort Worth police and Tarrant County prosecutors who brought him to justice. The series concludes Sunday. If you have missed a day, go to www.star-telegram.com/killer to catch up.

The story so far

After being arrested, murder suspect Andy Ortiz sat in silence through an interrogation, leaving police to continue looking into the possibility that he killed many girls and young women.

Chapter 21

On the night Andy Ortiz was finally arrested in the murder of Brenda Salazar, Fort Worth police Sgt. Joe Thornton drove to another clapboard house just a few blocks from where the criminal was taken down. Armida Garcia's parents and younger brother still lived on Denver Avenue. When they greeted the officer that night, Thornton told them that Ortiz had been arrested on a capital murder charge and that this time, he would probably be put away for good.

A day later, on Wednesday, Aug. 16, 2000, Armida's brother stood on the front steps of his home, talking quietly to a newspaper reporter. Yes, Fernando Garcia said in almost a whisper, he and his family were relieved and happy that Ortiz was off the streets. But no arrest could bring Armida back, the teenager said. No arrest could erase Fernando's memories of the night in August three years before when he came home to find his 15-year-old sister lying dead on the floor of their parents' bedroom, laces from his own tennis shoes tied around her neck.

That day on the porch, Fernando also referred to 13-year-old Krystal Minjarez, who had been murdered in much the same way as his sister.

'We're just hoping that this time it will stick,' Fernando said.

That same day, in Austin, Brenda Salazar's aunt Gracie Eguia answered her telephone and was surprised to hear Detective Curt Brannan's deep Texas drawl.

The last time Salazar's family had heard from the Fort Worth detective, he said his investigation into Salazar's murder had stalled. But now he was calling to say that police had arrested someone, a guy who was suspected of killing other girls, too. (The detective called Eguia first because Salazar's parents did not speak English.)

Eguia quickly called Brenda's parents, Fermin and Rosa Maria Salazar, at their home in the South Texas town of San Juan. They burst into tears.

'I just thought it was going to be unsolved for years,' Eguia told a reporter who called after Ortiz was arrested. 'Everyone is crying. My niece called this morning after she saw it on the news. She couldn't believe it.'

In Crowley, just south of Fort Worth, Victoria Curtis stood outside her trailer home, talking to a reporter that same day. Krystal Minjarez was Curtis' 13-year-old niece. A month before, the girl had slipped out of the trailer in the middle of the night, gone to a friend's home and left with a guy named Jaime. Curtis never saw her alive again.

'I am so glad,' Curtis said after she learned of the arrest. 'A big weight has been lifted off my shoulders. I don't know how [Ortiz] managed to stay out of trouble for so long. I just want him off the streets.'

What about the other cases?

On Thursday, Aug. 17, Brannan walked from police headquarters to the office of chief felony prosecutor Alan Levy. The homicide detective dropped off a summary of the evidence linking Ortiz to the Salazar killing. This time, Levy said, because of the DNA and fingerprint evidence, he would eagerly accept the case for prosecution. Such strong evidence would make it a matter of routine in most murder cases, but not in this one, not after bitter disagreements between police and prosecutors in the Armida Garcia case three years before. Both Brannan and Levy were relieved.

Yet so many questions remained about Ortiz. He was the primary suspect in the murders of Armida and Krystal, but so far the evidence against him in those two cases was insufficient to move forward. Krystal's body was so badly decomposed that any chance of obtaining physical evidence had been lost.

The crime lab had not been able to positively link the ligature around her neck with wire found during a search at Ortiz's home.

Brannan and the prosecutors decided to revisit every known aspect of Armida's case. As a result, the physical evidence, including the girl's fingernail clippings and hair fibers found on her body, would be sent to an independent laboratory for DNA analysis.

While reviewing the evidence, Brannan, Levy and Tarrant County prosecutor Robert Foran learned that Armida's fingernail clippings had not been tested for DNA three years earlier at the suggestion of the Fort Worth crime lab.

The

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