Man accused of SLO County beach killings says 50 years of hearing voices ‘broke my spirit’
Nearly 50 years of hearing voices in his head “broke my spirit” and made life “hell,” the man accused of fatally shooting two people at a San Luis Obispo County beach in 2001 testified Tuesday in San Luis Obispo Superior Court.
Stephen Deflaun is accused of killing San Pedro resident Stephen Wells, 37, and his 11-year-old nephew, Jerry Rios Jr., during an altercation over a camping spot at Morro Strand State Beach on July 8, 2001.
Deflaun, 64, faces charges of murder with a firearm and assaulting a peace officer with a firearm. He’s entered pleas of not guilty and not guilty by reason of insanity to each charge, respectively.
Deflaun testified Tuesday in San Luis Obispo Superior Court as the prosecution rested its case and his defense team began their arguments.
Deflaun was arrested in 2001, but was only deemed mentally competent enough to stand trial last year.
On Monday, Superior Court Judge Jacquelyn Duffy ruled that Deflaun’s past legal cases would not be shown to the jury.
Jurors were also not informed of the fact that Deflaun was previously deemed incompetent to stand trial.
The trial against Deflaun is currently in the guilt phase, meaning jurors are only weighing whether his actions were factually responsible for the deaths of Rios Jr. and Wells.
If he is found guilty, the trial will then move to the sanity phase, during which jurors will hear more testimony about Deflaun’s mental health history. That may include his past incompetence and not guilty by reason of insanity verdict.
Forensics expert: Defendant ‘asked why he was shot’
On Tuesday, prosecutors Eric Dobroth and Ben Blumenthal wrapped their arguments.
The prosecution called forensics specialist John Lehr, who has served with the San Luis Obispo County Sheriff’s Office, Pismo Beach Police Department and San Luis Obispo Police Department, to recount his analysis of the crime scene.
Lehr was serving as a sheriff’s deputy when he and his partner were dispatched to the state park’s campground around 7:30 p.m. on July 8, 2001.
By that point, Deflaun was on his way to the hospital, Lehr said, along with Wells. Wells died of his injuries at the hospital, while Rios Jr. was pronounced dead at the scene.
By the time Lehr arrived at the scene, his partner had already photographed and tented the scene, placing numbered plastic placards near items of interest.
Dobroth asked Lehr to walk the jury through a diagram of the crime scene to establish the location of the objects involved in the shooting.
Lehr was then asked to review some photos taken the night of the shooting — depicting spent bullet and shotgun shell casings, the kiosk near the entrance of the park where the shooting allegedly took place and the body of Rios Jr. — and testify about their significance to the jury.
Lehr said when he and his partner were finished at the crime scene, he visited Deflaun at Sierra Vista Regional Medical Center in San Luis Obispo around 2 a.m. on July 9, 2001, to collect gunshot residue from Deflaun’s hands.
Lehr said Deflaun agreed to the residue search under protest.
During the 15 minutes he spent with Deflaun, Lehr said the defendent was cooperative and seemed to understand his surroundings but “asked why he was shot.”
Lehr returned to the scene of the shooting at 11 a.m. that morning to search for additional evidence with the assistance of the Central Coast Treasure Hunters Association, a volunteer group that sometimes assists law enforcement with locating metal objects using metal detectors.
The search did not yield any additional evidence, Lehr said.
Lehr shot two videos of the scene the morning after the fatal shooting, which Dobroth showed to the jury to establish more context for the location of each piece of evidence.
Following a recess, the prosecution rested its case.
Defense calls toxicologist as first witness
Defense attorney Raymond Allen started by calling forensic toxicologist Bill Posey as a witness.
Posey, who retired from the field of forensic toxicology two years ago following a 45-year career as founder and co-owner of Clovis-based Central Valley Toxicology, testified about the toxicology report his company performed on Deflaun’s blood after the shooting.
A sample of Deflaun’s blood collected at 9:40 p.m. the day of the shooting revealed a. 0.12 blood alcohol content, Posey said, above the legal limit.
Posey estimated that, at the time of the alleged killings, Deflaun’s BAC may have been as high as 0.16%, give or take 0.01%.
Under questioning by Allen, Posey said he was not capable of determining whether Deflaun had marijuana in his system when the blood sample was collected because most screens conducted at that time did not test for the drug.
Accused shooter takes stand in murder trial
Allen then called Deflaun to the stand, establishing Deflaun’s life and his history of mental illness. The defendant was born in New York City and raised in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
Deflaun said he’s been a victim of what he called “the program” — describing it as a group comprised of the CIA and various religious institutions that keeps him in a state of panic and pain — since age 14 in 1973.
He testified that “the program” has tortured him, made him hear voices in his head and threatened to kill him for nearly 50 years, but denied that it’s an illusion or hallucination.
Under the program, Deflaun said, his thoughts, senses and experiences serve as entertainment for “everybody else in the world but me.”
Deflaun said he was first treated for mental health problems in 1976, when his mother said he needed help.
At a mental institution, Deflaun said, he was diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia, an assessment he doesn’t think is accurate.
When Allen asked him what “the program” has asked him to do, Deflaun began recounting the July 8, 2001, fatal shooting before the defense attorney cut him off.
Deflaun also answered Allen’s questions about his history of acting on his hallucinations.
Deflaun said he and his mother engaged in verbal altercations that would eventually become physical.
During one incident, he hit his mother on the arm several times during a “screaming match” that arose when he accused his mother of poisoning his food, Deflaun testified.
During a separate incident, Deflaun said, he was admitted to a mental hospital after breaking his mother’s nose accidentally during an argument.
When he was released from the mental hospital, Deflaun said he tried to get as far from his “persecutors” as possible, leaving for California in 1984.
Living in California was a “godsend” at first, Deflaun testified, but eventually his paranoia returned.
Starting in 1986, Deflaun said, he lived in a string of vehicles in an attempt to escape from “poison dust” he believes “the program” was using to torture him, eventually buying a brown van in 1988.
Using the van, Deflaun traveled to “any place where I could be free,” he testified, but the threat of poisoning never fully left.
Deflaun said this poisoning has worsened since 2014, causing him to begin losing his vision.
“’The program’ is simply everywhere,” Deflaun testified. “If I went to Timbuktu, ‘the program’ would be there,” Deflaun testified.
Deflaun lived in California in his vehicle without major incident until 2001, he said, when his mental anguish over the stresses of “the program” “broke my spirit” and made his life “hell.”
For instance, he said, the voices began telling him about the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks months before they happened.
What led to fatal Morro Strand beach shooting?
On July 8, 2001, Deflaun testified, he left a San Simeon campground and drove down the coast to Morro Strand State Beach.
When he arrived, Deflaun said, he was assigned a parking space by the kiosk attendant at the park’s entrance, though he believes the attendant intentionally gave him the wrong space number.
Once Deflaun reached the parking spot, he testified, he found a man named Michel Myers and his then-girlfriend there.
Myers then gave him directions to the correct campsite, Deflaun testified.
Deflaun said he left the park to go grocery shopping at a nearby Albertsons, where he purchased a 12-pack of Keystone beer, water, food and a newspaper. He then returned to the campsite, he said.
However, the voices from “the program” wouldn’t allow him to play his guitar or read the paper, Deflaun testified.
To relax, Deflaun drank all 12 beers in about two hours, he said.
That’s when he heard a knock on his van door, Deflaun testified.
Wells had told the two oldest kids traveling with him — Rios Jr. and his 11-year-old cousin, Brian Wells — to ask Deflaun if he planned to stay at the campsite, Dobroth said earlier in the trial.
Deflaun, who said he only saw Brian Wells, told the boys that he was staying the night. Sometime later, he said, the boys returned and asked the same question.
“’Are you stupid or something?’” Deflaun said he shouted at the boys.
When Stephen Wells came to Deflaun’s campsite to confront him about what he said to the boys, Deflaun testified he didn’t respond aggressively, though he was drunk at the time.
However, when Stephen Wells held out his hands in a pose similar to that of Jesus Christ on the cross, Deflaun said it made him more nervous.
Wells then returned to his motor home, Deflaun testified.
Though he felt safe in his van, Deflaun testified, he began hearing voices calling Wells a “fed agent a--hole,” which he later interpreted to mean “fed agent assassin.”
That thought was a “shock to my system,” Deflaun said. “I thought that was it. My life was over.”
Deflaun feared that if he stayed in the van, he would be killed, he testified, and if he went for a walk on the beach, he would be tortured or harmed.
Deflaun stopped short Tuesday of describing the shooting itself. He will continue his testimony Wednesday.
Judge: Stephen Deflaun must be restrained in court
After Deflaun left the witness stand Tuesday, Duffy dismissed the jury for the day and met with the prosecuting and defending attorneys in her chambers.
Afterward, Duffy told the court that the defense will continue its arguments Wednesday as planned with Deflaun on the stand.
However, this time Deflaun will be in restraints, Duffy said, noting that he has not been restrained or appeared in prison attire during any of his court appearances over the past year.
Because Deflaun testified Tuesday that he still hears and is influenced by voices no one else can hear, Duffy said, he could pose a safety risk in court were he to act on those voices’ instructions.
Visibly restraining Deflaun could alter the jury’s perception of the case, Duffy said, so Deflaun will be shackled to the witness stand at the feet using muffled restraints.
Duffy asked Deflaun to try not to move his feet, so as not to alert the jury.
Allen objected, and said there’s “no indication” Deflaun will act on what the voices might tell him.
This story was originally published April 11, 2023 at 8:18 PM.
