Law&Crime Sidebar - ‘Incredibly Disturbing’: California Woman Killed in Shooting Ambush, Kidnapped and Dumped in Field

Episode Date: August 25, 2023

A California woman vanished after she and her boyfriend were ambushed in a random shooting attack while sitting in their car at a park on Sunday. Andrea Vazquez’s boyfriend fled from the attack and when he returned, she was gone. Authorities tracked the 19-year-old’s phone and found her dead nearly 50 miles from the crime scene. The Whittier Police Department arrested 20-year-old Gabriel Esparza, the son of an LA County fire captain, and charged him with murder, kidnapping, and attempted rape. The Law&Crime Network’s Angenette Levy breaks down the “incredibly disturbing” case with Corey Pegues, retired NYPD deputy inspector.PLEASE SUPPORT THE SHOW:Save 10% on your entire POM Pepper Spray order by using code LAWCRIME10 at https://bit.ly/3rkw6gnLAW&CRIME SIDEBAR PRODUCTION:YouTube Management - Bobby SzokePodcasting - Sam GoldbergWriting & Video Editing - Michael DeiningerGuest Booking - Alyssa Fisher & Diane KayeSocial Media Management - Vanessa Bein & Kiera BronsonSUBSCRIBE TO OUR OTHER PODCASTS:Court JunkieThey Walk Among AmericaDevil In The DormThe Disturbing TruthSpeaking FreelyLAW&CRIME NETWORK SOCIAL MEDIA:Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lawandcrime/Twitter: https://twitter.com/LawCrimeNetworkFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/lawandcrimeTwitch: https://www.twitch.tv/lawandcrimenetworkTikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@lawandcrimeSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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your keychain, or carrying the unit in your pocket. Palm is the perfect everyday carry accessory. Palm's patented flip-top safety prevents any accidental misfire, and its maximum strength formula provides you with the necessary range and capacity to bring peace of mind to you and your loved ones quality safety performance peace of mind learn more at palm pepper spray dot com welcome to law and crime sidebar podcast i'm an janet levy wittier police say it appears that andrea vizquez and her boyfriend were the victims of a random attack last sunday just after midnight police say gabriel asparza shot vizquez at the parking stalls of penn park vizquez was in her car with her boyfriend when police say

asparza showed up and started shooting The boyfriend ran and when he returned he found blood and Vasquez gone. Her body was found the next night in a field of vegetation. Police took Gabriel Asparza into custody. He faces charges of kidnapping and murder. It's unclear why police believe Asparza killed Vasquez, but they say the attack was random. Asparza is being held without bail. Vasquez's family, meanwhile, has set up a GoFundMe page to pay for her funeral expenses. With me to discuss this case is, Corey Peggis. He is a retired deputy inspector with the NYPD and also the author of a book entitled Once a Cop. Corrie, welcome to Sidebar. Thanks for coming on. Thanks for having me.

Corey, this case is incredibly disturbing. We always hear that random attacks are rare. Police and Whittier are saying this was a random attack. What is your impression of this case? First of all, If this is a random attack, then we have a monster on the loose, but allegedly they have the suspect in custody who has done this. This is very rare. Random attacks are very rare. Usually with crimes, there's some kind of connection. The person knows the person, might have worked with the person, obviously family member, co-worker, so on and so forth. So when you see crimes like this and the cops come out and say that this was a random attack,

It really scares the community. I'm just happy that the alleged suspect has been taken into custody at this time. The allegations are stunning to me. This girl, Andrea Vasquez, she, Andrea, I should say, is in the vehicle at a park with her boyfriend. This is something people do. She's 19. The suspect is 20. And this is just something kids do.

I mean, it's it's just after midnight on Sunday. what what could be the possible motive here well so you know putting my police hat on immediately well it's not even rocket science for for me you know I'm looking at this and the first thing I'm thinking when I caught the case was this is a jilted lover that's the first thing because she's with another man in a vehicle uh ex-boyfriend somebody she used to deal with came up let the rounds go uh and ended up striking her and taking her way so that was my first impression. Obviously, I don't have intimate details of the case because I'm not in the police department, but they did a thorough investigation, and this is what they came up with

a random attack. And I can't wait to see how they came up with this. And if it is not any connection, because I'm still a little bewildered by how there's not a connection. Like, somebody just came to a park and just shot, letting rounds go and then grabbed a person. Like, it just doesn't make sense. The boyfriend ran and left his girlfriend, too, I guess. Somebody has to live to tell the story. I guess that was in his mindset, but he, he just left her there. But at least he came back. Correct. And that's another part of this. The boyfriend takes off, presumably, to get help. He returns. He sees blood. And then, I'm assuming, calls 911. And she's gone. So the killer, the suspected killer, scoops her up after shooting her and then dumps her body over in a field.

It's just, this is kind of one of those things I call a boogeyman attack. It's really creepy. It's very creepy. And so let me tell you know, doing two decades in the biggest police department in the world, or at least the nation, the NYPD, we have there's so many police officers, such as deep detective bureau. So when I see these crimes and then I look at these municipalities, they don't really have the structure that we have.

We have so much that we could go on. But I'm hoping that they got some outside help, maybe like the feds out there locally in LA, to come in and take a look at it because a random attack. So just think about this. If he did this random attack, how many other random attacks did he do? Because people usually don't wake up and just go to a park and start shooting. There's even some type of connection or this could be his first time. This could be his first rodeo. But my experience tells me if he did this once, he probably did it before.

So they need to start looking at all the cases that's unsolved out there of random shooters, especially in their parks, and start looking at him really hard, pinging his phone, seeing his phone at the time going up on his phone, seeing where he was at the time of these unsolved cases. Police show up at his workplace, take him into custody, no resistance there, according to the reporting we've seen, I guess just says, yeah, okay, whatever, take me in. And that part was a little strange to me, too. Most people don't run away. Cops are there. Some people resist. We don't know how many police officers went to the location. Obviously, if he was identified, they didn't just go with one or two cops.

He probably came with a team. He's in his workplace. It's only so far that he could run at that point. You have to understand that. Like, police work is all about three things. Gathering the information, analyzing it, and then, you know, deploying personnel or solving that case and this is what they did allegedly they got this case they got the information analyzed it and all roads pointed to him i want to know how the roads pointed to this person

that's what we're all looking to see how did the roads point immediately to that person maybe again it could be the electronic footprint they went up on the south tower see who was in the area at the time maybe some dna was left at this i i don't know but i can't wait to see and hopefully law and crime, you know, we get this trial and see what happens if he doesn't plead out. Corey Piggyz, retired Deputy Inspector with the NYPD. Thanks so much for coming on. We hope you'll come back sometime. Thanks for having me.

That's it for this edition of Law and Crime Sidebar podcast. You can download and listen to Sidebar on Apple, Spotify, Google, and wherever else you get your podcasts. And of course, you can always watch it on Law and Crimes YouTube channel anytime. Just remember to hit that subscribe button. I'm Ann Jeanette Levy, and we will see you next time.