Criminal proceedings dismissed in death of Vaca Police officer – The Vacaville Reporter

Serena CJ Rodriguez, 24, of Auburn, charged in the drunken death of Vacaville motorcycle officer Matthew Bowen, made her initial appearance in Solano County Superior Court in Fairfield on July 15. She was accompanied by Chief Public Defender Dan Messner. The criminal case against her was stayed Monday pending a report on her mental competency. (Reporter file/Richard Bammer)

At the request of defense attorneys and with the approval of the district attorney and a Solano County Superior Court judge, the criminal case against the 24-year-old woman accused of killing Vacaville police officer Matthew Bowen earlier this month was stayed Monday pending a mental competency evaluation due in a month.

The decision came when Rodriguez, who appeared agitated and talkative at the start of her arraignment scheduled for 1:30 p.m., heard the decision an hour later while sitting in a booth just outside the courtroom, able to hear but not watch the proceedings.

Judge Jeffrey C. Kauffman ordered Rodriguez, who remains in the Solano County Jail without bail, to return at 8:30 a.m. on Aug. 19 for a mental competency report. He assigned the case to Division 8 at the Justice Center in Fairfield, Judge Wendy Getty’s courtroom.

Rodriguez’s ending up in the booth – which had a window into the courtroom but was eventually closed by a bailiff – was the result of a series of actions by her, her defense attorney, Assistant Public Defender Dan Messner and Assistant District Attorney Paul Sequeira, who is leading the prosecution.

When she entered the courtroom at about 1:35 p.m., Rodriguez, shackled and clad in a prison jumpsuit, with her head freshly shaved, sat at the defense table with her back to the gallery. The courtroom was filled to standing room with dozens of Vacaville police officers, other law enforcement officials, sheriff’s deputies, Bowen’s relatives and District Attorney Krishna Abrams.

Messner then appeared to say that his client denied all allegations and made improvements. However, Rodrigues began to interrupt him and asked for a private attorney-client meeting. The judge allowed it, and Rodriguez and Messner left the courtroom and went into an adjacent smaller room. Judge Kauffman returned to his office.

Nearly half an hour later, Kauffman called the lawyers into his office to discuss a “Marsden hearing” – a defendant’s request to fire a court-appointed attorney on the grounds that the attorney is not providing adequate assistance or that there is a conflict between the attorney and the defendant.

The judge cleared the courtroom to hear Rodriguez’s plea.

At around 2:30 p.m., everyone returned to the courtroom and Kauffman denied Rodriguez’s request for a new attorney. Messner requested that the criminal proceedings be stayed until a so-called “1368 medical report” was completed.

Based on the findings of the report, a judge may reopen the case or, as a rule, order the defendant to be committed to a state hospital until his or her sanity is restored.

According to the law, specifically Article 1368 of the Penal Code, which gives the report its name, a defendant who is found mentally incompetent and unable to defend himself cannot be tried. However, once saneness is established, the defendant can face further legal action, including a jury trial.

Kauffman asked Sequeira if he was “thinking of a doctor,” and the lawyer named Andrea Shelley, a clinical and forensic psychologist from San Francisco. The judge then set August 19 as the deadline for the doctor’s report.

Rodriguez’s hearing on Monday took place one day before Bowen’s memorial service at the Father’s House in Vacaville.

According to the criminal complaint filed July 15, Rodriguez, a 5-foot-1, 100-pound Auburn resident, is charged with first-degree murder. Special circumstances apply because she is reportedly a convicted felon.

In addition, Rodriguez faces three aggravated charges as part of the murder charge: killing a police officer in the line of duty, a special allegation of using a deadly weapon, namely their vehicle, and using a deadly or dangerous weapon, namely a motor vehicle.

As previously reported, Bowen, 32, a motorcycle police officer, was struck just before 11 a.m. on July 11 when one vehicle collided with another at the corner of Leisure Town Road and Orange Drive in Vacaville. Multiple officials said online that he died at Kaiser Permanente Medical Center in Vacaville around 3:30 p.m.

The California Highway Patrol issued a press release later in the day stating that Rodriguez was allegedly under the influence of drugs when she was arrested after the crash. She fled on foot but was stopped by a passerby and booked into the Solano County Jail on suspicion of murder and driving under the influence causing injury and/or death.

Bowen, who joined the department in June 2023, leaves behind a wife and two sons, according to a statement from Vacaville police. Both children are under the age of 3, according to a family friend who also mentioned he lived in Dixon. Bowen also leaves behind his parents and a brother and previously served as a member of the Concord Police Department.