Attempted murder charges filed after attack in Berkeley tent
Police spotted suspect Rafael Lara Jr. "casually riding by on a bike" near Fourth Street a week after the attack, according to court papers.
A man who "became enraged" and attacked an intimate partner for hours, pledging to kill him in his tent near Aquatic Park, has been arrested, according to police and court papers.
Rafael Lara Jr. (no address) remains in custody this week at Santa Rita Jail, where he is being held without bail on charges including attempted murder, false imprisonment by violence, domestic violence, assault with a deadly weapon and robbery, according to court records.
Lara was also arrested on suspicion of a hate crime but was not subsequently charged with it, according to court papers.
Berkeley police wrote that the victim, a man in his 50s, walked into the emergency room at Alta Bates hospital seeking care on Sunday, July 28.
He had been stabbed and slashed, had multiple bruises and had been doused in gasoline, according to court papers.
Police said they determined that Lara, 46, had been in his tent with the victim near Heinz Avenue and the railroad tracks when Lara reportedly became upset during a discussion about homosexuality earlier that morning.
The victim told Lara it was "okay to be gay," police wrote, which "triggered" Lara.
He began punching, stabbing and slashing the victim with different items, police wrote in charging papers, and poured gasoline on him from a chainsaw gas tank.
Lara told the victim he was going to kill him "during the next 'long train' so no one could hear him scream," Berkeley police wrote.
The victim fought back and was able to keep Lara from setting him on fire, according to BPD.
The attack lasted 2-3 hours and only ended when a friend of the victim arrived and intervened, "keeping Lara at bay" so the victim could escape, police wrote.
After interviewing the victim at the hospital, police searched Lara's tent, where they found "a chainsaw, a shovel, knives, [a] metal pot, and several amounts of blood throughout the crime scene."
But Lara was nowhere to be found, police said.
During the attack, Lara took $300 from the victim as well as his iPhone, which police tried to track to find him, BPD wrote. That effort failed because the phone had been turned off.
Emilie Raguso
Just days after the attack, a massive fire broke out at 701 Heinz Ave. in a vacant commercial building in the immediate area of Lara's tent.
This week, BPD said it had not determined whether there could be a link between the two incidents.
Shortly after publication, the Berkeley Fire Department said the fire had caused more than $1 million in damage, according to a preliminary estimate.
"We cannot conclude with 100% certainty the cause of the fire," BFD said. "However, the fire appears to have started from the rear exterior of the vacant commercial building and worked its way inside."
A private insurance company and Union Pacific are also "conducting independent investigations into the cause," BFD said.
Officers continued to look for Lara and, on Sunday, Aug. 4, police on patrol near Fourth and Delaware streets recognized him "casually riding by on a bike" at about 7:20 a.m. and stopped him, BPD wrote.
Rafael Lara Jr. BPD
After handcuffing him, BPD found Lara in possession of more than an ounce of suspected methamphetamine packaged for sale as well as cash, two cellphones and burglary tools, police wrote.
During a subsequent interview, Lara "made some incriminating spontaneous statements regarding his interactions with the victim," BPD wrote.
According to court papers, Lara has felony convictions for robbery and assault likely to produce great bodily injury. The convictions, which took place in Contra Costa County in 2011 and 2016, sent him to prison, according to court papers.
Last week, on Aug. 7, Lara refused to appear in court for his initial arraignment date, according to court papers. During the hearing, Judge Elena Condes ordered him to be held without bail.
The next day, Thursday, Aug. 8, he again refused to appear for arraignment, according to his case file.
On Friday, Lara finally appeared before Judge Condes, who issued a domestic violence criminal protective order against him, according to court papers.
Lara is now set to enter a plea at Wiley Manuel Courthouse in Oakland on Aug. 21.
Editor's Note: This story was updated shortly after publication to include additional details from BFD about the fire on Heinz.
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Emilie Raguso
