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A 69-year-old Pharr man accused of fatally stabbing his girlfriend 14 times in 2017 will remain held in the San Antonio State Hospital after he was again found incompetent to stand trial.
Hidalgo County prosecutors and Angel Bolanos Vasquez’s defense attorney agreed on Monday to extend his commitment after Robert C. Arizpe, the superintendent of the San Antonio State Hospital, issued his opinion.
“It is the opinion of the treatment team that Mr. Vasquez remains incompetent to stand trial, is unlikely to restore to competency and continues to meet criteria for inpatient hospitalization,” the letter stated.
An order reflecting so will be entered into the record and likely signed by state District Judge Noe Gonzalez.
The Hidalgo County Sheriff’s Office arrested Bolanos at about 3:30 a.m. on Jan. 15, 2017 in the 3900 block of North Alamo Road in the La Mansion apartment complex in rural Edinburg for the murder of 55-year-old Rita Velasquez, who he had been dating for five months.
Authorities believe he stabbed Velasquez because he believed she was sleeping with another man inside the apartment they shared, but investigators determined there was no evidence of anyone else being in the residence.
He had remained jailed in the Hidalgo County Adult Detention Center since his arrest, and on Oct. 7, 2019, he was declared incompetent and ordered to go to the state hospital to restore his competency.
But that never happened.
On Oct. 14, 2020, Bolanos — in the thick of the pandemic — appeared via videoconferencing from the county jail for a status hearing on his competency.
It was clear during that hearing that he did not understand the nature of the proceeding, which Gonzalez, the judge, noted at the time.
It turned out Bolanos had never been taken to the state hospital, prompting Gonzalez to say: “This one fell through the cracks.”
On Feb. 22, 2021, he was finally picked up by staff from the state hospital and has remained there since.
The new order will extend his commitment to June 2025.
