West
California man arrested for brutal murder after being granted mental health diversion, having charges dropped
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A California man was arrested for allegedly committing a brutal murder just three days after he was granted immunity from prosecution for separate misdemeanor charges under California’s mental health diversion laws, prompting serious concerns about a system intended to protect public safety.
On July 11, Napa County prosecutors filed murder charges against Ramiro Ochoa Mendoza, 36, for the killing of Noel Batres, 47, whose body was found under a bridge on July 3. Mendoza allegedly killed Batres on June 27.
Mendoza, who had a history of criminal offenses and poor compliance on probation, was deemed mentally incompetent to stand trial earlier this year on misdemeanor charges including violating a restraining order and resisting arrest.
Despite numerous attempts by defense counsel to dismiss the cases outright, the Court, following legislative guidelines, ordered Mendoza into a mental health diversion program with supervised release for the two remaining misdemeanors.
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A Napa man was charged with murder just days after he was released, and misdemeanor charges were dismissed due to California’s mental health laws. (Napa Police Department)
Mendoza, however, failed to appear for his scheduled mental health diversion review and was deemed non-compliant with the terms of the program.
“Mendoza promptly failed to appear in court for his mental health diversion review and was found to be out of compliance with the diversion program,” the Napa County District Attorney’s Office said.
Even with repeated violations and non-compliance, the court was legally required to dismiss charges due to Mendoza’s mental health status and the misdemeanor-only nature of his offenses.
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“Because the law prohibits prosecution from continuing in cases where a defendant is deemed incompetent on only misdemeanor charges, the court had no choice but to dismiss both remaining cases and did so on July 8, 2025,” the DA’s office said.
The dismissal followed recent legislative reforms, specifically Senate Bill 317, that bar courts from restoring competency in misdemeanor-only cases, even if the defendant shows signs of escalating behavior.
Mendoza was re-arrested on July 11 and now faces murder charges with enhancements related to his prior offenses and the alleged brutality of Batres’ killing. The case is already fueling debate over the limits of mental health protections and their implications for public safety.
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A Napa man was charged with murder days after being granted mental health immunity. (Credit: iStock)
“This case highlights the real-world impact of the recent legal reforms, where courts are required to prioritize mental health treatment over traditional prosecution, even when defendants exhibit an unwillingness or inability to comply with court-ordered programs,” Napa County Deputy District Attorney Katie Susemihl said in a statement.
California Senate Minority Leader Brian Jones criticized California’s “mental health diversion” law, arguing it allowed a violent repeat offender to be released without proper oversight, leading to the murder of an innocent man.
“This is yet another devastating example of California’s soft-on-crime policies creating more victims instead of preventing crime. Under the so-called ‘mental health diversion’ law, a violent repeat offender was released and just days later, he brutally murdered an innocent man,” Jones shared in a statement with Fox News Digital.
“The system failed at every turn. This law prioritizes the rights of offenders over public safety, even when individuals show no willingness to comply with court-ordered treatment. If someone is truly mentally unwell, they should receive help within the justice system — not be dumped back onto our streets without accountability or oversight,” he continued.
Jones called the current system broken and urged legal reform to prevent further tragedies and better protect the public.
“Californians deserve better than laws that protect dangerous individuals while endangering the public. It’s time to fix this broken system before more innocent lives are lost,” Jones said.
A GoFundMe campaign was launched to assist with returning Batres’ remains to his home country of Guatemala. According to the page, Batres was a resident of Napa for 26 years.
“Noel was not perfect by any means. However, he was a wonderful, caring, gentle soul,” the page read. “We ask that you please help us send Noel back home to be seen by his immediate family one last time before they lay him to rest.”
Mendoza was being held without bail at the Napa County Department of Corrections.
Fox News Digital reached out to Governor Gavin Newsom’s office for comment, but did not immediately receive a response.
Stepheny Price is a writer for Fox News Digital and Fox Business. She covers topics including missing persons, homicides, national crime cases, illegal immigration, and more. Story tips and ideas can be sent to stepheny.price@fox.com
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Montana
Montana State doctoral student awarded national research service grant for gut microbiome, arsenic research
LAS VEGAS (FOX5) — Caltech researchers are preparing to build a radio telescope that will be the most sensitive ever constructed and survey the sky 100 times faster than any other radio telescope worldwide.
Schmidt Sciences has greenlit construction of the Deep Synoptic Array after the project completed its final design review. The milestone paves the way for construction to begin on the telescope, which is planned for a remote valley in Nevada.
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The array will consist of 1,650 radio dishes, each slightly more than 6 meters in diameter. The array will span an area of about 20 by 16 kilometers. The team plans to build the telescope by 2029, with science operations commencing soon after.
Survey capabilities
“The DSA will survey the entire visible sky several times in its first five years at unprecedented speeds,” said Gregg Hallinan, principal investigator of DSA, professor of astronomy at Caltech, and director of Caltech’s Owens Valley Radio Observatory. “While all other radio telescopes combined have so far found about 20 million radio sources, the DSA will match that in the first day of operations. By the end of its initial survey, it will have discovered about 1 billion new radio sources.”
The telescope will discover radio emission from millions of stars, galaxies, and other cosmic objects. It will address the mysteries of black holes, pulsars and fast radio bursts. It will also probe the physics of dark matter and gravity, and it will measure the structure and expansion of the universe.
“Radio astronomy is about to go from sketch to photograph,” said Vikram Ravi, the co-principal investigator of the DSA and a professor of astronomy at Caltech. “The DSA is looking at a far larger volume of the universe far more often than any other telescope.”
Real-time imaging
The DSA will be capable of making images in real time. The numerous radio dishes will feed into a supercomputer that creates images instantly. The images will be immediately accessible to the worldwide astronomical community.
“Without the radio camera, we would have to store 100 exabytes of data to complete our survey,” Hallinan said. “This would require 5 million hard drives in a multi-billion-dollar facility the size of multiple football fields. The radio camera solves this problem.”
The DSA’s radio camera will convert the raw data to images in real time with the help of an off-site supercomputer built from Graphics Processing Units built by Nvidia. The radio camera images will be given freely to the public with no proprietary period.
“We want the whole world to also have access to the data just as quickly as we do,” said Katie Jameson, the DSA lead project manager.
The DSA will have the ability to detect more than 100,000 intensely powerful flashes of radio light from fast radio bursts and to localize them to their home galaxies. The DSA will also reveal more than 20,000 new pulsars.
“The science that can be done is endless,” Hallinan said. “There will be enough discoveries to occupy every radio astronomer on the planet.”
The DSA is led by Caltech and funded by Schmidt Sciences. It is part of the Eric and Wendy Schmidt Observatory System. Two pathfinder projects that led to the DSA, the DSA-110 and the OVRO Long Wavelength Array, were funded by the National Science Foundation.
Copyright 2026 KVVU. All rights reserved.
SANTA FE, N.M. – Santa Fe County and Edgewood approved a new agreement and ordinance that secures ongoing fire and EMS services for Edgewood residents.
According to a joint announcement from the Town of Edgewood and Santa Fe County on June 19, the two governments negotiated and adopted a new Joint Powers Agreement and ordinance to keep the Santa Fe County Fire Department serving the town.
County and town representatives drafted the agreement together. The town adopted the ordinance unanimously at a special meeting on June 16, putting an end to weeks of uncertainty.
Santa Fe County District 3 Commissioner Camilla Bustamante said, “I believe we are all relieved to know that the people of Edgewood will continue to have the fire and EMS services necessary to protect their homes, their families, and their community. This community deserves nothing less.”
The announcement said the ordinance takes effect five days after final publication. The statement also said no further action or approval is needed to guarantee continued fire suppression, fire prevention, and EMS services for Edgewood residents.
Both governments noted the agreement will continue indefinitely unless either side ends it with five years’ notice.
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