Port Hueneme Man Pleads Guilty to Murder in Teen Cyclist's Death Five Years Later

Five years after he plowed his Lexus into a group of teenagers riding bicycles in Port Hueneme, killing one and injuring four others, Samuel Matthew Rocha has pleaded guilty to second-degree murder. Rocha, a Port Hueneme resident born January 25, 1993, admitted to using his car as a deadly weapon against 16-year-old Pedro Valdez and his friends, closing out a case that dragged on for more than five years through mental competency hearings and a deadlocked jury.

District Attorney Erik Nasarenko announced that Rocha pleaded guilty on August 24, 2026, according to a news release from the Ventura County District Attorney's Office. Senior Deputy District Attorney Richard Simon, who prosecuted the case alongside Craig Gardner, said the conviction “holds Rocha accountable and brings justice to Pedro Valdez, his family, and the other victims.” The case was filed under court case number 2021010640 and charged Rocha under California Penal Code sections 187(a) for murder, 245(a)(1) for assault with a deadly weapon, and 242 for battery, with weapon enhancements under Penal Code 12022(b)(1), per the district attorney's office.

A Night of Violence That Began at a Laundromat

The rampage that killed Valdez did not start at the crash site. Just 11 minutes before striking the group of bicyclists, Rocha was captured on surveillance video at the Queen Wash laundromat in Oxnard assaulting a couple and then driving his Lexus directly into an employee who had gone outside to photograph his license plate, according to BikinginLA. Prosecutors used that laundromat footage to establish a continuous pattern of vehicular assault stretching from Oxnard into neighboring Port Hueneme.

The fatal hit-and-run happened at approximately 9:27 p.m. on April 19, 2021, near the seven-lane intersection of North Ventura Road and East Pleasant Valley Road, directly in front of Naval Base Ventura County, where seven teenagers were riding fixie bicycles together, according to Vida Newspaper. A witness pursued Rocha's fleeing Lexus to his mother's apartment complex on the 500 block of East Clara Street in Port Hueneme, the same report noted, allowing responding officers to locate the abandoned car and arrest him.

Five Years of Delays Before a Guilty Plea

Criminal proceedings against Rocha stalled for years after his defense attorney raised a doubt about his mental competency in June 2021, triggering court-ordered psychological evaluations that initially found him unfit for trial before that determination was later reversed, according to KCLU. Under California law, criminal prosecution pauses under Penal Code 1368 whenever a defendant's competency is formally questioned, which explains much of the five-year gap between the crash and this month's plea.

When the case finally reached trial in April 2026, a jury convicted Rocha of four counts of assault with a deadly weapon and two counts of battery, and sustained a special allegation of causing great bodily injury during commission of a felony. But jurors deadlocked on the murder and attempted murder counts. That partial verdict, as KEYT reported, left prosecutors weighing a retrial against a negotiated plea; four months later, Rocha's guilty plea to second-degree murder resolved the remaining charges.

Sentencing Set for October, Community Still Grieving

Rocha, who has remained held in custody without bail, is scheduled to be sentenced on October 27, 2026, at 9 a.m. in Courtroom 12 of Ventura County Superior Court, where he faces a maximum sentence of 27 years to life in state prison, per the district attorney's office.

Valdez's death was the fourth bicyclist fatality recorded in Ventura County in 2021, matching the county's entire bicycle fatality total for 2020, according to BikinginLA's earlier reporting. In the aftermath, the Port Hueneme City Council approved municipal funds for a public memorial honoring the 16-year-old at a local park, including a community bicycle repair station, following vigils and fundraisers held by residents. Port Hueneme sits roughly 65 miles west of downtown Los Angeles along the coast, bordered by Oxnard and Naval Base Ventura County, as Us Weekly noted in its coverage of the plea. Victim impact statements from Valdez's family and the surviving teenagers are expected to be presented at the October sentencing.