Jury convicts Fort Worth man ‘misbranded as a Cain-like murderer,’ defense says
In an eyewitness’s final telling of the encounter, Ricardo Delgadillo had been involved in an argument with his older brother Carlos over whether the elder man had sufficiently stuck up for him in their youth.
Early on Nov. 3, 2019, Ricardo told Carlos to get out of their mother’s house in Fort Worth. Carlos did not take the directive seriously.
Ricardo pulled the trigger of his 9mm pistol one time under circumstances that are in dispute. Carlos was hit.
Two of the brothers’ cousins were the only other people in the bedroom where the shooting occurred. One of the cousins drove Ricardo, Carlos and the other cousin from the house in the 4600 block of Dilworth Court to a medical clinic. Carlos was taken in an ambulance to a hospital and pronounced dead. A pathologist concluded that his death was caused by a gunshot wound of the chest. He was 30.
For a jury in Criminal District Court No. 4 in Tarrant County the question last week was whether the killing was criminal and, if it was, whether it was an act of negligence, was reckless or, as the Tarrant County District Attorney’s Office argued at Delgadillo’s murder trial, intentional.
In a pretrial response to a state motion seeking to restrict, in the trial’s guilt-innocence phase, discussion of the defendant’s military service and associated mental health problems, retained defense attorneys Mark Daniel and Marshall Searcy described their client as “misbranded as a Cain-like murderer of his beloved brother.”
Charles Overstreet, a Tarrant County College psychology professor hired by the defense, interviewed Delgadillo after the homicide and diagnosed him with five disorders: post-traumatic stress, major depressive, schizoaffective, generalized anxiety and alcohol use.
“The true genesis of all this sadness was ... the lingering trauma of PTSD induced by the defendant’s valiant military service as a dedicated Marine in the Afghan war,” Daniel and Searcy wrote. “Yet, the State, to its shame, wishes to stunningly hide these glaring realities — combat intense military service followed by resulting PTSD — from the jury, thus allowing the prosecution to march to an unmolested ‘guilty’ verdict — based on a half-truth and then pack this heroic veteran off to prison — probably ending his tortured life (and certainly his very successful rehabilitation).”
The jury learned of Ricardo Delgadillo’s military service in the first trial phase.
In its verdict, the jury rejected the lesser included offenses of manslaughter and criminally negligent homicide and found Delgadillo guilty of murder. On July 25, the panel imposed a 10-year prison term. Delgadillo will become eligible for parole when he has served five years of the sentence.
The jury was instructed to consider a prison term of between five to 99 years or life, or, if it found Delgadillo was under the immediate influence of sudden passion, two to 20 years.
Case of brother killing brother ‘sad and tragic’
The jury was in the first trial phase instructed to consider whether the defendant was justified in the use of deadly force in self-defense.
“This sad incident arose when the damaged veteran spontaneously reacted — as he had been taught by our government — to a perceived threat, not through any purpose or intent to harm his brother,” Daniel and Searcy wrote in response to the prosecution’s motion. “The act may have been negligent or even reckless — but never intentional.”
Fort Worth Homicide Unit detectives first believed that Ricardo Delgadillo recklessly shot his brother as he was showing his rifle and handgun. In an interview, Delgadillo told the detectives that he was showing his brother and cousins how to hold the gun when he pointed it, lined the sights at a shelf and he pulled the trigger.
During a subsequent interview with detectives, at least one of the Delgadillos’ cousins, Elias and Sebastian Sustaita, changed his account to describe an intentional shooting.
On the night Ricardo shot Carlos, who worked as an electrician, the brothers and their cousins were on television watching UFC fights and the Canelo Alvarez-Sergey Kovalev boxing match in Las Vegas.
Assistant District Attorneys Matthew Hinojosa and Thomas Schmidt represented the state.
The instructions that Judge Bob Brotherton gave to the jury indicate that Delgadillo testified in the guilt-innocence phase and did not testify in the punishment phase.
“We respect the jury’s service and decision in this case,” Daniel and Searcy wrote in response to a reporter’s inquiry. “Ricardo Delgadillo is a decorated United States Marine Corp veteran. He is truly a genuine American hero. This case is sad and tragic in more ways than anyone can ever describe.”
This story was originally published August 1, 2025 at 11:04 AM.
