A man accused of shooting and killing two workers at Methodist Dallas Medical Center last year testified in his own capital murder trial Wednesday, telling jurors the shooting was unintentional.
Some of that testimony to the jury played out between snippets of graphic camera footage from the day of the shooting — footage that prosecutors say proves Nestor Hernandez intentionally killed a nurse and a social worker that day in the hospital.
Hernandez, 31, was visiting his on-and-off girlfriend Selena Villatoro on Oct. 22, 2022 in the hospital’s maternity ward, the day after she gave birth to their son. He said 45-year-old social worker Jacqueline Pokuaa was in their room attempting to break up a physical fight between himself and Villatoro.
He said as Villatoro was pulling his black thermal shirt over his head in the scuffle, while he also hit her over the head with his pistol, the gun “went off,” killing Pokuaa beside them.
“Everything slowed down,” Hernandez said. “I was kind of confused for a little bit, and the first thing that Selena said, she was like, ‘what did you do?’”
Panicked, Hernandez said he opened the room’s door and fired twice into the hallway without looking outside in order to cause a distraction. One bullet hit and ultimately killed 63-year-old nurse Katie “Annette” Flowers, who he said he didn't see.
“I never intended to kill nobody or hurt nobody,” he said.
When Hernandez appeared in the doorway, Methodist Hospital Sergeant Robert Rangel shot him in his upper right thigh. Hernandez said he jumped back into the room and called his mom and little brother, telling him he had just shot someone and been shot himself.
Villatoro had their newborn in her arms at this point, Hernandez said, still hooked up to an IV after her C-section the day before. Hernandez said he was shouting at her to give him the baby so he could put the infant in his bassinet because he thought police were going to come into the room and kill him.
Then he said he was prepared to leave the room and die anyway, but Villatoro told him to think of their son.
"I was like, 'I don't want to go back to jail, bro,'" Hernandez said. "'I ain't trying to go back to prison.' I already spent most of my youth in there."
Part of his testimony was interspersed with clips provided by the prosecution showing uncensored police body camera and surveillance footage inside the hospital the day of the shooting, in which an officer can be heard negotiating with Hernandez amid screams.
George Lewis with the Dallas County District Attorney’s Office pushed back on Hernandez’s explanation of the shooting, questioning why he could be heard telling the sergeant he had a hostage in the room and saying there was no way to work things out as the sergeant suggested.
Lewis also asked how the shooting could have been unintentional if Pokuaa ended up with a gunshot wound directly in the middle of her head as autopsy photos showed.
Hernandez said he wasn't thinking straight at the time of the shooting, also admitting on the stand to coming down from a methamphetamine high from Thursday.
“You killed both of these women that day, didn’t you?” Lewis said.
“I did, but not intentionally, sir,” Hernandez said.
Hernandez's relationship with Villatoro was rocky, he said, especially after he was released from prison on parole in 2021 for aggravated robbery. Leading up to the moment of the shooting, he had accused her of cheating on him and giving him a venereal disease.
Hernandez testified he'd put his black pistol away in Villatoro's bag the day before the shooting — the bag he said he helped her carry into the hospital. He said she told him to get rid of it if he wanted their son to have Hernandez's last name.
Hernandez denied threatening to kill himself, Villatoro or anyone else who walked in the room, as Villatoro testified.
Prosecutors rested their case in the trial Wednesday after bringing on several expert witnesses that morning and early afternoon. Attorneys argued forensics and firearms analysis tied Hernandez to the crime.
Dallas police photos of the crime scene showed blood — both Pokuaa's and Hernandez's — splattered and smeared on the floors and walls of the hospital room and the hallway.
Dallas County Medical Examiner Travis Danielsen said the bullet split into two nearly identical fragments when it pierced Pokuaa's skin, one piece going into her brain and killing her.
"There's very few things that will cause an instantaneous death, and this doesn't have any of those features, so it would not be instantaneous," Danielsen said.
After being shot, Flowers had managed to walk to the nurses' station down the hall before collapsing behind the desk. Surveillance footage showed a Methodist Dallas nurse attempting chest compressions on Flowers before other officers and staff dragged Flowers' limp body toward the elevators. The bullet pierced the left side of her face, damaging her jaw, carotid artery, right jugular and other parts of her head.
Katie Flowers' daughter Kelly Flowers sobbed in the courtroom gallery as medical examiner Stephen Hastings explained photos of her mother's dead body.
The district attorney’s office chose not to pursue the death penalty for Hernandez, which means he faces an automatic life sentence if convicted of capital murder.
His attorneys are asking the jury for a lesser charge of murder. Defense attorney Paul Johnson explained to Hernandez outside the presence of the jury what rights Hernandez would and wouldn’t have if he testified.
“Bottom line, this is your case, it’s not our case,” Johnson said. “We have given you advice as to what we think. Well, our advice is not really important at this point in time. The only question is right now, do you wish to take the stand in your defense?”
“Yes, sir,” Hernandez said.
Closing arguments and jury deliberations are set to begin Thursday.
Got a tip? Email Toluwani Osibamowo at tosibamowo@kera.org. You can follow Toluwani on Twitter @tosibamowo.
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