Oxnard Parolee's GPS Monitor Helps Convict Him in Fatal Alley Shooting

A Ventura County jury has convicted an Oxnard man of murder in the July 2023 fatal shooting of Oscar Rodriguez, a case investigators say was cracked open by the very GPS ankle monitor the killer was required to wear while on parole. Omar Romo, 34, now faces up to 110 years to life in state prison when he is sentenced in October.

Rodriguez, 44, was shot three times in an alley on the 700 block of Cooper Road at around 1:14 a.m. on July 12, 2023, according to the Oxnard Police Department. Responding officers found him in the alley before he was rushed to Ventura County Medical Center, where he later died of his injuries. Ventura County District Attorney Erik Nasarenko announced that Romo was convicted by a jury of murdering Rodriguez, per a news release from the Ventura County District Attorney's Office.

An 11-Week Investigation Ends With an Arrest Behind Bars

Detectives with the Major Crimes Unit spent 11 weeks working the case before arresting Romo on September 28, 2023, while he was already sitting in the Ventura County Main Jail on unrelated charges, the Oxnard Police Department's Facebook page reported at the time. He was initially held on $2 million bail before trial, per the same account. Police had not identified any clear relationship or motive connecting Romo and Rodriguez at the time of that 2023 arrest, and it remains an open question whether trial testimony ever established one.

The break in the case came from an unlikely source: the electronic monitor Romo was required to wear as a condition of his parole for a prior robbery conviction. As reported by KEYT, prosecutors used GPS tracking data from that device to place Romo at the alley scene at the time of the shooting.

Surveillance Video and a Search of Romo's Home

Investigators also linked Romo to the crime through surveillance footage that showed him driving a black Honda Accord and wearing clothing matching what witnesses described, the station's report states. Detectives later executed search warrants and recovered the murder weapon along with ammunition from Romo's residence and vehicle.

Senior Deputy District Attorney Hayley Moyer, who is assigned to the DA's Major Crimes Gang Unit, prosecuted the case; prosecutorial records classify Romo as a known gang member. “There is no place for using a firearm to resolve conflicts, and this conviction holds the defendant accountable for that choice,” Moyer said, according to the Ventura County District Attorney's Office. The jury also convicted Romo of assault with a semiautomatic firearm and possession of a firearm by a felon, and found true a special allegation of personal and intentional discharge of a firearm, along with strike priors as an aggravating factor.

A Maximum Sentence of 110 Years to Life

Romo, an Oxnard resident born December 17, 1988, remains held without bail in Ventura County jail pending sentencing, scheduled for October 22 at 9 a.m. in Courtroom 25 of Ventura County Superior Court. Under California Penal Code Section 12022.53(d), a firearm-discharge-causing-death finding like the one jurors returned against Romo triggers a mandatory consecutive enhancement of 25 years to life, on top of any sentence for the underlying murder conviction.

How the Case Fits Into Ventura County's Crime Picture

The killing happened during a year when the Oxnard Police Department recorded 13 total homicide incidents, including seven murders, three negligent manslaughters and three justifiable homicides, according to Vida Newspaper. Countywide, violent crime in areas patrolled by the Ventura County Sheriff's Office rose 38.1% between 2021 and 2025 even as the county held its standing as the safest large county in California, per California Department of Justice data cited by Guardian National Security. Property crime over that same span fell nearly 20%, the outlet noted.

That local uptick stands in contrast to statewide trends: California's monthly homicide rate hit its lowest point since 1985 by late 2024, according to the Public Policy Institute of California, even as Ventura County saw a localized 14% increase in homicides that year relative to its historically low baseline. Romo's case, built on a mix of ballistics evidence, surveillance footage and the parole GPS data meant to track him, lands squarely within that uneasy stretch for a county otherwise known for its low crime rates.