The investigation of the July 3 death of Abel Garza, a 41-year-old resident of Santa Rosa, has entered another phase with the arrest and booking of a suspect. Garza died just yards off Matheson Street in a parking area near Williamson Wines, following at least two encounters with others at Hotel Healdsburg or nearby.
Romario Morga Cisneros, 34, from Santa Rosa, was arrested on a charge of involuntary manslaughter on Aug. 9, following a police investigation into the circumstances of Garza’s death some five weeks earlier.
“After a thorough investigation and weighing all evidence in the case, the investigation was submitted to the Sonoma County District Attorney’s office for consideration of charges,” read a statement from Healdsburg Police.
“Cisneros was involved in the altercation with Garza immediately preceding his death, and the investigation revealed that Cisneros’s actions exceeded self-defense when he struck Garza with a metal object,” reported Healdsburg Police in the statement on their Facebook page.
The July 3 incident began a little before 9:30am, when several men working in the pool area of Hotel Healdsburg encountered Garza and told him he had to leave. The hotel has a small parking lot and guest reception entrance at 25 Matheson St., across the street from where Garza was later found mortally injured.
In the confrontation, Garza reportedly threw toilet paper in the pool, struck a bellperson and took a hotel worker’s tools, reported as a nail gun or similar. Reports indicate that Garza was shirtless, and possibly associated with a skateboard and a green F-150 truck, wherein was found alcohol.
During investigation of the first incident, police made contact with a 45-year-old woman who was considered possibly associated with Garza. She was cited on an outstanding Lake County warrant for credit card fraud, and was later questioned during the investigation of Garza’s death.
Garza left the hotel area but returned later that same morning, at about 10:20am. This time, he was carrying a hammer and what was described as “an unknown metal object” that some reports characterized as a gardening stake.
He was also reported to have had confrontations with at least one other individual in the area, and reportedly threw the hammer before leaving the scene for the parking area behind The Wurst across the street.
At some point, a physical fight occurred between three of the presumed hotel workers and Garza, during which one of the hotel employees suffered minor injuries.
Shortly thereafter, at 10:21am, police began receiving calls of an unresponsive man in the parking lot that Williamson Wines shares with Relish Culinary Adventures, at 14 Matheson St. A little while later, the police closed off the area to the public; their attempts to revive the injured man proved unsuccessful, and he was pronounced deceased at the scene.
The following day, a crime scene clean-up team from Vallejo scrubbed down the location where Garza died, including a looping trail of blood leading to the place where he expired.
The police investigation held that the suspect, Cisneros, allegedly struck Garza with the metal object that Garza had been carrying.
Cisneros was arrested on Wednesday afternoon, July 9, booked into Sonoma County jail and held in lieu of $30,000 bail. He was no longer listed in custody the following day.
Healdsburg Police said throughout that they received cooperation from the men who encountered Garza, presumably including the suspect.
A spokesperson for Hotel Healdsburg refused to comment on the incident, referring inquiries to Healdsburg Police.
The county coroner’s office has not yet released a report on the cause of Garza’s death. “This decedent’s cause and manner of death are not yet releasable,” said Sonoma County Sheriff spokesperson Misti Wood. She added that such “death investigations take a few weeks or a few months.”
