Antolin Garcia Torres, the Morgan Hill man accused of kidnapping and murdering 16-year-old Sierra LaMar, waived his right to appear for a motion on subpoena hearing scheduled at the Hall of Justice in San Jose Wednesday.
Garcia Torres, 21, is charged with murder and a special circumstance of kidnapping in relation to the disappearance of Sierra, who was 15 at the time she went missing March 16, 2012.
He has been in custody since his May 22 arrest on suspicion of that crime, and in November was further charged with three unrelated kidnapping attempts that took place in the parking lots of two Safeway stores in Morgan Hill in 2009.
All the charges against Garcia Torres are felonies.
The hearing scheduled for Wednesday was continued to Feb. 20 at the same courtroom in San Jose, according to Santa Clara County Superior Court staff. The hearing was continued at the request of the District Attorney’s office, as the prosecutor assigned to the case could not attend court Wednesday due to a family emergency.
A plea hearing for Garcia Torres was also set for April 4.
Garcia Torres has waived his right to appear in court for numerous proceedings since he was charged with murdering Sierra.
Sierra, who was a sophomore at Sobrato High School sophomore at the time of her disappearance, vanished from her mother’s north Morgan Hill home while she was walking to her usual school bus stop near the intersection of Palm and Dougherty avenues. Her remains have not been found, but authorities think she is dead based on her lack of contact with anyone since her disappearance.
Items that belonged to Sierra, found by sheriff’s investigators in the vicinity of her home, contained DNA evidence linking her and Garcia Torres, authorities said. Furthermore, Sierra’s DNA were found in Garcia Torres’ car.
Investigators have also said DNA evidence links Garcia Torres to at least one of the 2009 Safeway kidnapping attempts.
Sierra’s family, friends and volunteers continue to search every Saturday for any evidence indicating where she may have gone. For more information on the search efforts, go to www.findsierralamar.com.
