Arrest record of DA’s son to be ‘sealed and destroyed,’ judge says

The arrest record of Ethan Morse, son of District Attorney Larry Morse II, no longer exists, a judge ruled Wednesday.

Morse, 18, was arrested last year and charged with murder in connection with the March 30, 2013, slaying of 18-year-old Bernabed Hernandez-Canela, who was gunned down outside a large house party on Westside Boulevard. Merced Superior Court Judge Ronald W. Hansen, however, cleared Morse of any wrongdoing in the death after a four-day preliminary hearing in November.

The state attorney general’s office on Wednesday did not oppose the motion to destroy the arrest record. State attorneys had prosecuted the case in light of the involvement of the Merced district attorney’s son.

Hansen on Wednesday granted a motion from Morse’s attorney to seal and destroy records of his arrest in connection with the case.

State prosecutors accused Morse of being behind the wheel of a getaway vehicle during a drive-by shooting.

During the November preliminary hearing, however, the judge said the evidence didn’t support that theory. In his ruling, Hansen said evidence in the case showed Morse was factually innocent of the charges.

Morse’s attorney Kirk McAllister told the Sun-Star that the fact the attorney general chose not to oppose the motion to destroy Morse’s arrest record was a tacit admission that the case should never have been filed. “It’s a recognition they got it wrong,” McAllister said after Wednesday’s hearing. “It’s the first reasonable thing they’ve done in this case.”

The attorney general’s office declined to comment.

Sheriff Vern Warnke said the case is considered closed. “We’re looking forward to moving on to other matters,” Warnke said Wednesday.

Warnke said he stands behind the detectives and deputies who investigated the case against the younger Morse.

“We presented the case to the attorney general’s office and they made the decision to file it,” Warnke said. “We gave them what we had on the case, and they thought it was enough to pursue. If they made any mistakes, I don’t know.”

Warnke stopped short of criticizing the attorney general’s office, but said he believes sheriff’s detectives simply did their jobs.

“The decision we made to present (prosecutors) with the information we had was a normal decision, one that we make on a regular basis with the district attorney here,” Warnke said. “They thought it was enough to pursue it, but evidently it wasn’t.”

McAllister went on to say Morse had “a front-row seat to the justice system at its best and at its worst.”

“It was at its worst when they decided to jail an innocent person for murder,” McAllister said. “It was at its best when an independent, impartial judge reviewed the real facts and rendered a just decision on those facts.”

The man accused of being the shooter, 18-year-old Jacob Tellez, also was found factually innocent Nov. 14 by Hansen.

Morse, throughout the proceedings, said he didn’t know anything about the homicide but said he and Tellez were together the night of the shooting and that Tellez never fired a weapon.

Two other teenagers also were killed the night Hernandez-Canela died. All three were shot during a large high school party in the 9200 block of Westside Boulevard, outside Atwater. Hernandez-Canela was shot and killed in front of the home, while Samantha Parreira, 16, and Matthew Fisher, 19, were shot in the backyard.

Two men, Jose L. Botello and Jose M. Carballido, have been charged with murder in the deaths of Fisher and Parreira. Both defendants have pleaded not guilty. They are scheduled to appear in court again in April.

This story was originally published March 25, 2015 at 10:33 AM with the headline "Arrest record of DA’s son to be ‘sealed and destroyed,’ judge says."