Jorge Torres

Jorge Torres' death in a suitcase was examined through medical testimony and competing arguments about two phone videos. In opening statements, William Jay argued that Sarah Boone confined Torres to punish him; James Owens alleged repeated abuse by Torres and characterized the suitcase as a restraint used in self-defense. These were opening positions, not findings. Medical examiner Sara Zydowicz testified that Torres died from positional asphyxia with environmental suffocation and classified the manner of death as homicide. She described multiple blunt-impact injuries but could not determine whether they occurred inside the suitcase. Under cross-examination, she said those injuries were unlikely to have contributed to death. She could not establish how long Torres was confined or precisely when he died, and her inference about his position was not based on observing him inside the suitcase.

Torres' relationship with Boone also arose in family testimony, accounts of earlier domestic calls and disputes over medical records. His brother Juan described their last telephone conversation on February 23, 2020, recalling Boone yelling in the background about choking without remembering her precise words. Deputy Jessica Ramirez Delgado testified that she observed swelling and bruising around Boone's right eye and markings and abrasions around Torres' neck during a July 2018 call. Corporal John Alden described redness on Boone's neck and near Torres' left eye during an August 2019 call, confirming that Torres was arrested. In considering Torres' hospital records from 2017 and 2018, the court permitted factual treatment narratives and blood-alcohol information but excluded the remaining records unless the defense established their relevance.