Murder trial ends in minor conviction, 180-day sentence
Addressing the man she believes escaped justice in her son’s violent death, Andrea Sylvester stunned a packed Travis County courtroom Wednesday with her assessment of the punishment given to defendant Bryan Canchola.
“I am thankful you’ll only spend six months in jail,” Sylvester told the 22-year-old Canchola. “Because I don’t want your mama to hurt.”
The idea that Canchola would serve only 180 days in jail — it’ll probably end up being about 90 — might have seemed incomprehensible a week ago when his trial opened with prosecutors pursuing a handful of felony charges, including murder. He admitted to a 911 operator in July 2015 that Ste- phen Sylvester, his boyfriend with whom he shared a west campus apartment, had stopped breathing after they fought.
But the murder charge and other serious charges disappeared this week, not long after a Travis County medical examiner dropped a bombshell on the day before he was scheduled to testify, informing attorneys he had reached a new conclusion in Stephen Sylvester’s cause of death. The flip-flop irked state District
Judge David Wahlberg, who announced Monday that he too had changed his mind and tossed most of the doctor’s testimony after originally telling the jury they could consider it. Absent the presence of a credible cause of death ruling, Wahlberg acquitted Canchola of the most serious charges.
On Wednesday, jurors acquitted Canchola of the final felony charge, aggravated assault, that had alleged Stephen Sylvester suffered a broken neck bone at the hands of his boyfriend. He faced up to 20 years in prison, but evidence supporting the charge was mostly circumstantial.
Instead, the jury convicted Canchola of a single misdemeanor assault charge for inflicting injuries to Sylvester’s head and other parts of his body.
Rather than letting the jury assess his punishment, Canchola’s team struck a deal with prosecutors for 180 days in jail, a sentence that includes a guilty plea he entered Wednesday to a related animal cruelty charge for injuring Harlow, Sylvester’s 7-pound Yorkie.
Canchola is ordered to return to court Thursday morning to begin serving his sentence. He spent 42 days in jail after his arrest before posting $50,000 bond. He will serve roughly 50 additional days and should be out by Christmas.
“When you spend your six months in jail, I’ll be praying for you, Bryan,” Andrea Sylvester said. “I know what it’s like to not be able to pick up the phone and call your son.”
The jury of 10 women and two men took the unusual step of returning to the courtroom after the reading of the verdict to take in statements from Sylvester’s family. Several jurors wiped tears as Andrea Sylvester told Canchola that instead of preparing student aid documents for her son, she had to pick out his casket.
Her sister, the victim’s aunt, implored Canchola to “get help, get counseling, get your anger together.”
Families for both men declined interview requests outside of court, as did lead prosecutor Andrea Austin.
Wahlberg declined to elaborate on his decision to exclude Andrews’ testimony, but probably said enough last week in court — “disgusted.”
Andrews, who joined the medical examiner’s office two months before Sylvester’s death, concluded from his autopsy that Sylvester died from a severed neck artery that arose from force that broke the hyoid bone in his neck. But after Canchola’s defense questioned that finding at a pretrial hearing this month, Andrews said he reviewed autopsy photos and located bleeding in the base of Sylvester’s brain that he had missed before.
His new finding supported prosecutors’ belief that Sylvester died from a second fight with Canchola after he returned to the apartment. Sylvester had gone to a nearby hospital for injuries related to the earlier fight, but left before seeing a doctor.
Andrews did not respond to repeated requests for an interview. Neither did Beth Devery, the chief administrative officer at the medical examiner’s office. A person who answered the phone at the office said Andrews will not be working the rest of this week, but declined to say whether his absence is discipline-related.
The American-Statesman has requested his personnel file.
“The facts he gave to support his second decision simply don’t support that decision,” lead defense attorney Gerry Morris said.
This is not the first time Andrews changed his cause of death ruling with little or no warning. Last year, he testified at a murder trial in New Mexico that a homeless man killed by police officers died from a combination of gunshot wounds from both officers. He previously said that one of the officers — and not the other — fired the fatal shot. Andrews worked in Albuquerque before starting in Austin in May 2015.
Morris called Wahlberg’s decision to exclude Andrews’ testimony “very courageous.”
“There are very few judges that will stick to their principles and follow the law to that extent, understanding it will be an unpopular decision,” Morris said. “That’s not something we see a lot out of our elected judges.”