Charges against a Cal Fire captain indicate the alleged motive for a double murder: He killed his girlfriend and her young son because they were potential witnesses against him, prosecutors say.
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Darin McFarlin, 47, was arrested shortly after midnight Friday, Aug. 22, near Bridgeport. Three hours earlier, El Dorado County sheriff’s deputies had been called to his Cameron Park home, where they found a woman and a child who had been shot.
The woman, pronounced dead at the scene, was identified as McFarlin’s girlfriend, Marissa Herzog, 29. The child, who died at a hospital, was her son, a second-grader.
Nobody else was in the house, the sheriff’s office said, but a “second juvenile” who resided there was found safe.
McFarlin was 150 miles from the home, and on the other side of the Sierra Nevada, when he was found and detained in Mono County. He was returned to El Dorado County, where he appeared in court Monday and pleaded not guilty to charges including two counts of first-degree murder and one count of attempted murder.
According to the criminal complaint, McFarlin intentionally killed Herzog and the boy because they were witnesses to a crime. The attempted murder charge relates to the second child; also alleged were domestic violence and child abuse.
The complaint (embedded at the bottom of this article) alleges that McFarlin first assaulted Herzog in the bedroom of their home Thursday night. When she went to the dining room to make a phone call, he got a gun and shot her, the account says.
Of Herzog and the child, the complaint says each “was a witness to a crime and was intentionally killed because of that fact.”
The prosecutor has alleged special circumstances that could make the case eligible for the death penalty: multiple murder and murder to prevent testimony.
McFarlin is being held without bail. His next hearing is set for Sept. 29.
The public employee database Transparent California says McFarlin has been a fire captain since 2012 with the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection. TV station KCRA reported that he works for the agency’s Amador El Dorado unit.