Fairfield Twp. police acquired an arrest warrant last week for 18-year-old Jordan A. Spain of Milford for his involvement in the 2018 homicide of Sydney Garcia-Tovar, who was 16 when she was shot and killed in the 7500 block of Wildbranch Road in Tyler’s Creek Townhomes.
Late on Tuesday, Miami Twp. police in Clermont County arrested Spain, and Fairfield Twp. police booked Spain in the Butler County Juvenile Detention Center for murder and two counts of felonious assault, all with gun specifications.
Spain was arraigned this morning by a magistrate in juvenile court and ordered to remain in the detention center and is scheduled to be before a juvenile court judge on Tuesday, according to prosecutors. The case is not an automatic bind over to adult court, but a judge will have to determined if Spain should be tried as an adult and sent the case to common pleas court for grand jury consideration.
According to juvenile court documents, police believe Spain is the person who fired the shot that killed Garcia-Tovar.
Spain “did shoot and kill Sydney Garcia-Tovar. Victim was shot in the head,” according to the court offense document signed by Sgt. Brandon McCroskey. The court document also accuses Spain of firing a 45-caliber handgun into Garcia-Tovar’s occupied car.
At the time of Garcia-Tovar’s death, Spain was 14 and lived on Wildbranch Road, where the shooting occurred. The case has been filed in the juvenile court system because of his age at the time of the offense, said McCroskey.
The Journal-News does not typically name juvenile suspects unless they are tried as an adult, but it is happening in this case because Spain is now an adult.
Credit: Provided
Credit: Provided
On July 23, 2018, Garcia-Tovar was fatally shot inside a car outside the Tyler’s Creek Apartments. She was pronounced dead the next day. A second gunshot victim, Joseph Goolsby of Hamilton, was found with non-life-threatening injuries and has since recovered from his injuries.
Markeylnd Townsend, 23, is also accused in the killing of Garcia-Tovar. He was arrested two weeks after the homicide on an unrelated aggravated robbery charge in Hamilton and sentenced in April 2019 to three years in prison for the second-degree felony. While in prison, Townsend was indicted in April 2021 for murder with a gun specification and felonious assault.
Townsend is accused of firing a weapon into a car full of people driven by Garcia-Tovar.
Townsend’s trial was scheduled to begin in January but was rescheduled until Sept. 19. He is also scheduled to be back in Butler County Common Pleas Court for a final pretrial hearing on Sept. 14.
