FORT LAUDERDALE, FLA. (WSVN) - The sister of Jason Banegas, the young man convicted of killing a Hollywood Police officer in 2021, took the stand to ask for mercy as a jury weighs whether he receives a death sentence or life in prison.
Katherine Banegas told the jury about the close relationship the two had growing up.
“It’s like we share the same soul. I feel everything he feels and I’m pretty sure he feels everything I feel,” said Katherine.
The defense showed a baby picture of Jason to the Broward courtroom in hopes jurors remember that image as they contemplate whether the confessed killer will spend the rest of his life behind bars or be sentenced to death.
Earlier in the day, the defense called on a clinical psychologist to describe the Banegas’ “family dysfunction” in detail.
“We know that there is poverty, that there is family dysfunction and distress, and there is substance abuse,” said doctor Yenys Castillo.
Castillo met with Jason in jail on eight separate occasions since the shooting happened in October 2021.
He was 18-years-old when he shot and killed Yandy Chirino while the Hollywood Police officer was responding to reports of someone trying to break into cars in the Emerald Hills neighborhood.
A struggle ensured between the two before Banegas would ultimately fatally shoot Chirino in the face two times.
Back in court, Castillo described Jason’s life as being trouble from the start, testifying that his father was a cocaine and sex trafficker, who abused his mother.
“At one point, an event happens when they are traveling in a car and Omar throws Ingrid out of a moving car, he opens the door and throws her, and she ends up in the hospital, and the kids remember this,” she said.
On Wednesday, his mother, Ingrid Villanueva, provided testimony by video asking for her son’s life to be spared.
“I ask for forgiveness on behalf of my son. My son has never been inhuman. He has always been a very humble person, and I ask the judge to please spare his life,” said Villanueva.
Castillo then told jurors that Jason got into trouble as a juvenile but never received the help he needed, leading to multiple suicide attempts.
“He tried to hang himself, and it was so tight around his neck, that knot, that they had to use what they call ‘the knife of life,’ knife hooked and doesn’t harm kids, were able to cut it,” said Castillo.
Prosecutors then asked Castillo if she acknowledged that Jason understood what the consequences would be for pulling the trigger on Chirino.
“Yes, he knew them. I’m not saying at the moment he was thinking of those consequences…,” said Castillo.
“But he knew right from wrong?” the prosecutor asked.
“Yes, correct,” said Castillo.
With Banegas pleading guilty to killing Chirino, the jury is only determining what his sentence will be.
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