Jury Deliberates Informant Slaying Case

After a three-week trial, jury deliberations began Monday in the case of an a man who is on trial for the murder of a Camarillo police informant.

Prosecutors argued Raul Quiroz Jr., 31, shot and killed longtime friend Brian Szostek, of Camarillo, then 24, in 2005. The UC Santa Barbara student’s body was found with multiple gunshot wounds.

Police testified that Szostek had been arrested over ten times on drug chargers and agreed to be an informant after a recent arrest in exchange for charges not being filed against him.

Prosecutors claim Szostek used Quiroz, who was unaware he was working with police, to make contact drug dealers Shane Keller and Hector Flores and make drug purchases from them. Both Keller and Flores were subsequently prosecuted.

After the arrest and prosecution of those high-level drug dealers, prosecutors claimed Quiroz became suspicious that Szostek was an informant and took it upon himself to eliminate the potential threat.

Quiroz’s attorney, Richard Loftus, urged the jury to “look behind all of these statements” made by the prosecution’s witnesses who themselves had questionable backgrounds and would do anything to receive a lighter sentence. Loftus said it was well known that Szostek was an informant and others connected in the drug world could have killed him.