Opening statements begin in 2015 killing of teenager outside Camarillo Taco Bell

CHUCK KIRMAN/THE STAR Tyler James Ostertag talks with his attorney Ron Bamieh during a previous court appearance.

Inside a Ventura courtroom Monday, a prosecutor told jurors that Tyler Ostertag didn’t like to lose a fight.

Senior Deputy District Attorney Blake Heller was giving his opening statement in Ostertag’s murder trial in Ventura County Superior Court.

Ostertag is accused of killing Daniel Morales, who had played football at Camarillo High School. Morales was 16 when he was fatally stabbed.

Ostertag appeared in front of the Ventura County Grand Jury on Feb. 19, 2016. He was indicted on a murder charge with a special circumstance that he used a knife to kill Morales on Aug. 31, 2015. He also was indicted on suspicion of trying to dissuade a witness from reporting the crime. 

Ostertag, who was 20 then, has pleaded not guilty.

Heller said Ostertag had fought one of Morales’ friends in an empty parking spot outside a Camarillo Taco Bell around lunchtime. Morales had watched the fight, which was in front of a crowd of at least a dozen people.

CONTRIBUTED PHOTO Daniel Morales.

Angry and embarrassed after losing, Ostertag went to a car several parking spots away and grabbed his knife, Heller told jurors. Then he went back and stabbed Morales, who died hours later at the hospital, authorities say.

In court Monday, Ostertag’s defense attorney, Danielle De Smeth, didn’t dispute that her client had stabbed Morales. But, she told jurors, there were other sides of the story.

The more jurors look, she said, the more questions she thinks they will find.

In her opening statement, De Smeth listed flawed assumptions made in the case, including that Morales was the victim and that the fight had started in the parking lot.

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About Morales, she said jurors would learn during the trial that he loved to fight. 

There had been an ongoing “beef” between Morales’ friend and Ostertag. Morales had been inside Taco Bell with friends that day when Ostertag showed up.

Ostertag was with a group of roughly nine others, when they pulled into the parking lot in two cars, according to witnesses.

Morales called his friend to tell him that Ostertag was there. It was “the opportunity for them to get even,” De Smeth said.

When that friend got there, he parked in the lot several spots away from Ostertag and the others.

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De Smeth told jurors they would hear that Morales’ friend continued to stare over at Ostertag.

She also said that when Morales was stabbed, Morales had some kind of a weapon in his hand, too.

While Morales never got the chance to testify about what happened that day, Heller said, witnesses have said they saw Ostertag throw the first punch in the fight with his friend. 

People thought the fight was over when Ostertag then ran 80 feet to the car to grab his knife, Heller said, and then retraced those 80 feet.

When Ostertag had the knife in his hand, Morales appeared to be striking at him with some sort of a metal stick, according to a cellphone video shown in court. Heller told jurors it looked like Morales tried to grab what he could and jumped in front of his friend.

A screenshot from the video shows the friend sandwiched between Morales and the truck, as Morales and Ostertag face off.

After, everyone scattered.

Morales’ friend got him to a hospital and “he continued to fight for 11 more hours,” Heller told the jurors. But, he said, the medical examiner would later testify that he hadn’t stood a chance against the wound.

De Smeth also told jurors that Ostertag had a documented history of mental illness, including being diagnosed with bipolar disorder at 10. She said jurors would hear that a doctor found he wasn’t getting the help he needed in August 2015.

The trial will continue this week in Courtroom 26.