Relationship between Barsi and Reyes followed cycle of abuse and
reconciliation
Gilroy – Franca Barsi tried to break up with David Reyes, but she always seemed to get sucked back in.
The on-again, off-again relationship between the former Gilroy Garlic Queen and Reyes, a San Jose man who in August appeared on the Gilroy Police Department’s most wanted list, was marked by cycles of emotional abuse and reconciliation, according to Barsi’s family and closest friend. They believe she died this week while trying to finally bring that abuse to an end.
Police found the body of the 38-year-old single mother at her home Wednesday morning, 12 hours after Barsi’s mother, Mara Perez, filed a missing person’s report. On Thursday morning, police arrested Reyes as the only suspect in Barsi’s murder, following an hour-long car chase. The Santa Clara County District Attorney’s Office has not yet filed formal charges, but expects to arraign Reyes Monday at 1:30pm in San Martin Superior Court.
Those closest to Barsi never saw signs of physical abuse, and they say she never complained that Reyes hit her or Andrew, her 10-year-old son. But they still believed the relationship was unhealthy.
“From my heart, I knew he must have had some kind of hold on her,” said Perez, who encouraged her daughter many times to seek counseling. Perez said she does not believe her daughter ever sought out that help or filed a restraining order against Reyes.
The 39-year-old seemed to have a good relationship with Barsi’s son, who never showed cause for concern during frequent visits with his grandmother in Gilroy or aunt in Hollister. Still, Barsi’s sister Lauretta Avina said “the one and only time I met him I got a really bad impression. I was trying to tell her ‘You can do better than this.'”
Barsi rarely spoke of Reyes with her sister or mother. Instead, she confided the darker details of the relationship in her best friend of 30 years.
“It started off as mental, but she did tell me one incident where he was physical,” Belinda Pratt-Garcia said. “They would get into a very heated argument and he would begin to throw things around her and break things around her. I believe he pushed her but she didn’t go into any details. I think she was worried I would come down or bring someone with me to beat him up. She would say he’s not like this all the time. She said, ‘He promised he wasn’t going to hurt me again.’ I told her not to let him back into her life.”
The couple first met several years ago in the check-out line at PW Supermarket, where Barsi worked as a cashier, Pratt-Garcia said. Barsi described Reyes with excitement, though her friend was immediately concerned upon hearing that Reyes had recently been released from jail. Pratt-Garcia would not say why Reyes had been in prison. Asked if it were the type of crime that would alert Barsi against entering into a relationship, she broke into tears and said “yes.”
Reyes was previously arrested for sexual assault, according to an online database of sex offenders.
It’s unclear if Barsi was aware of more recent arrest warrants issued for Reyes. In August, his mug shot appeared in the Dispatch as part of GPD’s most wanted list, in connection with charges of armed robbery and for failing to register as a sex offender. A month earlier, in July, Barsi had her stepfather change the locks on her home in the gated condominium complex at 8155 Westwood Drive. Yet her parents never knew the extent of the problems surrounding Reyes.
“We could have called the police and told them where he was,” said her stepfather Raymond Perez.
On Tuesday afternoon, Barsi called her son’s cell phone to let him know she had to go to San Jose and that he would need to ask his grandmother for a ride home from school. Her family and best friend believe Barsi had finally decided to end the relationship.
“I have a feeling the night that she died, that was it,” Pratt-Garcia said. “He just couldn’t take no for an answer. He didn’t want to let it go. I think that’s why she made the phone call. She didn’t want her son to be around what was going to happen. She protected her son from everything.”
Victims of domestic violence leave a relationship up to seven times before they end it permanently, according to Perla Flores, director of domestic violence and sexual abuse programs at nonprofit Community Solutions. Victims worry about physical threats or the prospect of losing income or housing, Flores said. Often they genuinely believe the person loves them and will change.
“Unfortunately, when a victim of domestic violence tries to leave a relationship permanently, that is when it’s most dangerous for her,” Flores said. “Domestic violence is about power and control. When an abuser feels they’re losing control of that victim, the ultimate means of having control is taking a life.”
