Updated
Updated · Berkeleyside · Jun 5
Berkeley Police Charge 28-Year-Old Damarcus Jones in Killing of Vanessa Sanchez, 37
Updated
Updated · Berkeleyside · Jun 5

Berkeley Police Charge 28-Year-Old Damarcus Jones in Killing of Vanessa Sanchez, 37

1 articles · Updated · Berkeleyside · Jun 5

Summary

  • Damarcus David Jones, 28, was charged Thursday with murdering Vanessa Sanchez, 37, after Berkeley detectives arrested him Tuesday in Dixon; he is being held without bail.
  • Surveillance footage showed Sanchez entering her California Street apartment with Jones on May 24, and the criminal complaint says he killed her on May 26 before trying to conceal the death from neighbors.
  • Sanchez, a former college admissions administrator who moved to Berkeley in 2018, had been battling metastatic breast cancer since a 2022 diagnosis, according to her family obituary.
  • Jones was convicted of felony assault in Berkeley in November 2025, and his arraignment has now been postponed twice, from Thursday to Friday and then to Monday.

Insights

Will a new California bill finally close the legal loopholes that endanger domestic violence victims?
With a violent felony record, how was the suspect free to commit another brutal crime?
Beyond this one tragedy, how is the media failing to report on California's wider domestic violence crisis?