Gilroy: Driver charged with murder in DUI crash that killed pregnant woman
GILROY — A Mountain View man with four prior DUI convictions has been charged with murder after authorities say his blood-alcohol level was twice the legal limit during a head-on crash on New Year’s Day that killed a pregnant woman and her unborn child, court records show.
Jesus Carlos Temores, 50, faces two counts of murder in the deaths of 29-year-old Rachel Marie Gonzalez Gallegos and her five-month-old fetus, according to a California Highway Patrol report and criminal complaint filed Tuesday by the Santa Clara County District Attorney’s Office.
Prosecutors also charged Temores with a count of driving under the influence of alcohol causing injury, for the reported injuries suffered by the man driving the vehicle in which Gonzalez Gallegos was riding.
The murder charges were filed using what is known as a Watson murder theory, which is applied to defendants with prior DUI convictions. Since such defendants are required in court to formally acknowledge the danger of their actions and undergo court-mandated education about driving while under the influence, the theory asserts that any subsequent drunken driving violation constitutes implied malice, or knowingly engaging in behavior likely to cause serious injury or death.
In California, an implied malice murder is also referred to as second-degree murder. The district attorney’s office last filed a Watson murder charge in August against a driver in a DUI crash that killed a San Jose community service officer.
According to the CHP, around 6:30 p.m. on Jan. 1, Temores was driving a white GMC pickup truck east on Leavesley Road past New Avenue when he crossed the double-yellow lines on the road and headed into oncoming traffic. The truck hit a white 2021 Chevrolet Equinox SUV head-on then hit a 2020 Honda sedan before stopping.
Gonzalez Gallegos and her unborn child were rushed to a hospital, where they died that evening. The 28-year-old man driving the SUV suffered a head injury, and a 4-year-old boy riding in a car seat was treated for cuts to his head and a concussion.
The criminal charges filed Tuesday do not reflect the boy’s injuries. The CHP said four people riding in the Honda suffered minor injuries.
In the aftermath of the collision, responding officers “noted objective signs of alcohol intoxication including red and watery eyes and a strong odor of alcohol” on Temores, according to a probable cause affidavit filed by the CHP.
Temores also reportedly “performed poorly” during three field sobriety tests, the CHP reported. Two chemical breath tests he submitted to officers about an hour after the crash showed blood-alcohol concentrations of 0.172% and 0.177%, each more than twice the legal limit of 0.08%.
The affidavit states that Temores was last convicted of DUI in Merced County in 2015, and had three DUI convictions before that in the same county.
Temores was scheduled for arraignment Tuesday in a San Jose courthouse. He is being held without bail in the Santa Clara County Main Jail.