Victim’s son describes his father’s homicide
Popp stands accused of shooting, killing 3 people
Jesus Manso-Carraquillo barely knew his neighbor in the other upstairs apartment of a four-unit building on the south side. His family had given the man food on Thanksgiving 2015. That was their only interaction before a fatal encounter the following March.
Manso-Carraquillo told a jury Monday that he and his father were on their way to the basement laundry room when the man — they didn’t even know his name — stopped them in the hallway and asked where they were from.
Puerto Rico, they told him. Dan Popp replied, “Oh, that’s why you don’t speak English,” Manso-Carraquillo recalled. Then Popp asked if they wanted a beer or to smoke. They declined.
Moments later as father and son climbed the stairs back to their apartment, Popp suddenly appeared over them, pointing a rifle from the second floor to the landing. He said, “It’s time to go,” Manso-Carraquillo said.
“He shot my father in the face,” the son testified calmly. “My first instinct was to help my father, but my body reacted a different way.” He ran out of the building, escaping another shot that followed him.
The dramatic testimony came on day one of a trial to determine if Popp should be held legally responsible for killing three of his neighbors and trying to kill Manso-Carraquillo in March 2016.
Popp, 41, pleaded no contest in September to the fatal shootings of Phia Vue, his wife, Mai Vue, and Jesus Manso-Perez, and the attempted homicide of Manso-Carraquillo.
They all lived in a building near S. 92 St. and W. Beloit Road. The Hmong community has called for Popp to be charged
with hate crimes. The Vue family is Hmong-American.
Popp also pleaded not guilty by reason of mental disease or defect. His attorney, Christopher Hartley, must convince 10 of 12 jurors that at the time, Popp suffered from a mental disease or defect and that it prevented him from understanding what he did was wrong or from conforming his actions to the law.
Hartley said during his opening statement that both court-appointed psychologists believe Popp meets the criteria for the so-called NGI defense.
On Monday, he also played video of Popp, who was arrested without incident outside the apartments, talking to police and to himself while handcuffed inside a police wagon.
Popp talks about terminators, giant icebergs and attack dogs. At one point he says, “How dare you? You brought him on our spaceship?” and at another, cries out loudly, “Father! Why have you forsaken me?” before more calmly saying he would like to go fishing.
Asked if he’s on medication, Popp tells an officer he takes hydrogen “because the molecules split.”
Assistant District Attorney Paul Tiffin told jurors he agreed with the chilling facts and circumstances as Hartley laid them out, but not with his conclusion. Tiffin told jurors psychologists’ conclusions are just opinions, and the jury must make the final decision.
If the jury rejects the insanity defense, Popp would be sentenced to mandatory life terms.
If the jury finds Popp met the burden of his defense, he would be committed indefinitely to a secure state mental hospital for treatment.
Popp was initially declared incompetent to understand the charges and aid in his own defense, but after months of treatment, a state doctor determined Popp was feigning certain symptoms and had gained competency.
Another doctor disagreed, but a judge found Popp competent.