Cause of death determined for 13-year-old allegedly killed by soccer coach
Oscar Omar Hernandez's body was discovered alongside a Ventura County road on April 2. While the medical examiner listed the manner of death as homicide, the cause of death was acute ethanol intoxication.
The boy's soccer coach, Mario Edgardo Garcia-Aquino, 43, is charged in his death as Hernandez was last seen leaving his Sun Valley home to meet Garcia-Aquino at his home in Lancaster. His family became concerned when the teen did not come home the next morning as planned. He was found dead in Oxnard five days later.
The Los Angeles County District Attorney's Office charged Garcia-Aquino with murder, including special circumstances for lewd acts with a child. Garcia-Aquino is alleged to have killed the boy on March 28, two days before he was reported missing, according to the district attorney's office.
Hernandez's family said they dropped the teen off at a San Fernando Valley Metrolink station the evening of March 28 so he could help his coach make soccer jerseys at his Lancaster home. According to the family, the two were introduced to each other through an after-school soccer program.
"His soccer coach made soccer jerseys," Oscar's sister, Alejandra Hernandez said. "He had taken other soccer teammates to help him, and that's why my brother went."
Family members called Oscar the same night that he left to check on him, but the coach answered the phone and said the boy couldn't answer because his hands were full of paint, Alejandra said.
The family said the coach was expected to drive Oscar home the next morning, and after that time had passed, he told them that he had dropped the boy off in the afternoon. Calls to Oscar's phone went unanswered, but there was a response from the phone to a text, which said, "I'm going to a party," according to the family.
According to Oscar's sister, a text from Oscar's phone to his family said that he was in North Hollywood and refused to be picked up at Whitsett Park. Those were the last texts relatives said they received from the 13-year-old's phone. They searched for Oscar throughout Saturday night but couldn't find him.
The family called the Los Angeles Police Department on Sunday morning to report Oscar missing.
Detectives, with help from the FBI, discovered a body matching the description of the missing teen in the small woodland area near McGrath State Beach.
Garcia-Aquino was arrested by LAPD officers before he was transferred into the custody of the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department.
The soccer coach also faces child sexual abuse charges stemming from a 2022 case that the Los Angeles Police Department investigated.
Garcia-Aquino pleaded not guilty on June 18 to the charge of murder, including special circumstances for lewd acts with a child
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