Verdict returned for man accused of killing Stanislaus sheriff’s deputy Dennis Wallace
After less than a day of deliberations, a jury on Monday afternoon found David Machado guilty of first degree murder in the killing of Deputy Dennis Wallace in November 2016.
Machado shot Wallace in the head and neck at the Fox Grove Fishing Access in Hughson shortly after a dispatcher told the deputy Machado had been flagged for officer safety concerns and was in possession of a van his mother reported he stole.
Machado fled, carjacked a couple in Ceres and tried to carjack a woman in a small town in Tulare County before he was captured by two officers.
The prosecution said the murder was committed in the first degree because it was premeditated.
Two weeks before the shooting, Machado was out on bail for a prior felony offense when a warrant was issued for his arrest for failing to appear in court the day jury selection was supposed to begin in that case. Afterward he made statements to several people that he would not go back to jail and he planned to “shoot it out” with police.
Machado’s attorney, Marcus Mumford, had argued this was a case of second degree murder, saying if Machado had really planned to do that he would have shot Wallace the moment he approached him and also would have shot the officers who detained him in Tulare County.
“So clearly Mr. Machado had no intention of shooting it out with police,” Mumford said in his closing statement last week. “He acted irrationally and impulsively and because of that he did not commit first degree murder.”
Machado was also convicted of two counts of carjacking and attempted carjacking and being a felon in possession of a firearm.
Sheriff Jeff Dirkse attended court on Monday.
“The jury reached the decision that it did and while it’s (been) tough for the department, tough for the Wallace family, at least at this point, in my opinion justice is being done,” Dirkse said outside the courthouse. Wallace’s wife, mother and brother also attended the reading of the verdict. Nobody from Machado’s family was there.
The case did not end with the verdict. It now goes to the sanity phase as Machado had entered concurrent pleas of not guilty and not guilty by reason of insanity.
The jury will return to court Thursday for opening statements in the sanity phase, which is expected to last a few weeks. The jury will have to decide if Machado lacked the capacity to act with criminal intent when he shot Wallace.
This story was originally published March 29, 2021 at 2:52 PM.
