BYRON — A 22-year-old Antioch man is facing charges that he crashed into a car containing three women and a toddler while attempting to pass by driving against traffic, but police say they found evidence it was far from his first dangerous maneuver behind the wheel.
The defendant, Jonathan Perez-Gaspar, faces charges of vehicular manslaughter and two counts of reckless driving, all felonies, for allegedly killing 20-year-old Jaleesa Martinez, and injuring Martinez’s mother and friend in the December 2022 crash. Martinez’s 1-year-old daughter was also in their car but escaped injury.
At around 3:10 p.m. on Dec. 18, 2022, Perez-Gaspar allegedly drove his BMW into southbound traffic on Byron Highway to pass slower cars, then swerved back, striking a red Volkswagen containing Martinez and her family. He would later estimate his own speed at around 85 mph, authorities said.
A GoFundMe page that raised $18,000 for Martinez’s family describes her as a nursing student, “serious grammarian, and former cheer captain who aspired to be a teacher.
“Jaleesa was a beautiful soul with a warm heart and quick smile, who was loved by so many. She was so many things to so many people,” the page says. “When Jaleesa set her mind to something, she worked hard to achieve it, and was so proud of being a first generation college student with excellent grades, all while working and caring for her beautiful daughter.”
Martinez’s mother suffered a collapsed lung, and her friend suffered a broken bone. Other motorists stopped to help and took turns holding Martinez’s daughter while paramedics tended to the injured parties. Perez-Gaspar stopped too and cooperated with officers, according to the California Highway Patrol.
But it was a GoPro camera found in Perez-Gaspar’s BMW that, to police, put the crash into context. They say they found several videos showing Martinez hitting speeds of more than 120 mph as he raced other drivers.
The rules of most street races are simple, a CHP investigator wrote in court papers: The two cars line up, count down and whoever leaves the other one in the dust wins. The only prize is the satisfaction of knowing you out-drove the other guy.
“One, two, three,” Perez counted down before giving the other driver a thumbs up, as seen on a video taken seven days before the fatal crash. The two then accelerated from roughly 40-130 mph, and the race was on, authorities say. Another video from eight months before the crash showed him hitting 164 mph.
Police say Perez also had a speeding ticket on Dec. 4, 2022, and had crashed his car into a wall roughly one year earlier, in 2021.
Perez had his first court date back in January, and is next due in court April 12, records show. He remains out of custody, under a court order to submit to drug and alcohol testing, though police say drugs and alcohol weren’t a factor in the deadly crash. He is prohibited from driving a car, records show.