Four months after jurors deadlocked on a second-degree murder charge after trial, a former Long Beach Unified School District safety officer pleaded no contest to voluntary manslaughter on Tuesday, Aug. 20, for the fatal shooting of an 18-year-old woman near Millikan High School in September 2021, authorities said.
Eddie F. Gonzalez, 54, is scheduled to be sentenced in Long Beach Superior Court on Oct. 8, and faces either three or six years in state prison under the plea agreement, said Pamela Johnson, a spokeswoman with the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office.
Following trial in April, jurors deadlocked on a second-degree murder charge in the fatal shooting of 18-year-old Manuela “Mona” Rodriguez, who was struck in the back of the head as she sat in the passenger seat of a fleeing vehicle about a block north of the school’s campus. A jury foreperson told Judge Richard M. Goul that the panel was split 7-5 in favor of guilt following a roughly week-long trial.
Gonzalez had worked for the school district for about seven months when the fatal encounter occurred. Prior to working for LBUSD, Gonzalez had worked in brief stints with the Los Alamitos and Sierra Madre police departments.
Gonzalez was wrapping up his shift on Sept. 27, 2021 when he saw a fight between Rodriguez and a then-15-year-old Millikan student along Palo Verde Avenue just south of Spring Street. Gonzalez stopped his patrol SUV and separated Rodriguez and the girl. He sat the student on the curb as Rodriguez, her boyfriend Rafeul Chowdhury and Chowdhury’s younger brother got into Chowdhury’s Infiniti sedan.
Gonzalez walked up to the passenger side of the car, drew his weapon and slammed the hood twice before Chowdhury took off, turning the car briefly in Gonzalez’s direction before straightening out, then turning left through the “L” shaped parking lot. Gonzalez fired twice, with one shot going through a rear passenger door window and into the front passenger headrest before it hit Rodriguez in the back of the head. The other was lodged in the rear passenger door, according to evidence presented during trial.
The shots appeared to be fired from behind the car.
Rodriguez was hospitalized, but was taken off life support a week after the shooting.
Gonzalez was fired by LBUSD a week later, after it was determined the shooting was outside district policy. He was arrested at his home in Orange about a month after the shooting.
At issue during trial was whether Gonzalez was in reasonable fear for his life when the shots were fired, or if the threat had already passed by the time he pulled the trigger.
The shooting was captured on surveillance video and multiple cellphone videos quickly emerged on social media. The video appeared to show Gonzalez step away from the car as it started moving, then within a second, firing the two shots.
Prosecutor Kristopher Gay told jurors in April that Gonzalez “responded to youthful disobedience with deadly force” and was “not done trying to stop that car” when he fired the shots.
Gonzalez’s attorney, Michael Schwartz, argued that three witnesses had said they thought Gonzalez would be run over by the car and that the case boiled down to “less than two seconds.” He also said Gonzalez had reason to try to detain the three people in the car after the student told him her cell phone was stolen and that Rodriguez had threatened to kill her family.
Whether Rodriguez was there specifically to find the girl was also in dispute, as the defense attorney told the jury Chowdhury’s younger brother had told detectives the fight was planned.
Chowdhury told detectives they went to Long Beach from San Pedro to pick up Adidas shoes for their then 5-month-old child, which they had purchased through OfferUp.
Gonzalez remains free after posting $2 million bond in July 2022. He had spent roughly nine months in jail following his October 2021 arrest.
