SAN JOSE, Calif. (KRON) — Joseph Charles Vicencio, the man accused of carrying out a triple homicide in San Jose, told a witness that he needed to tie up “loose ends” before the killings, court documents filed on Friday state. A police report reveals that the killer’s motive may have been to silence a domestic violence victim.
The victims of the triple shooting were identified in court documents as Tarrah Lynn Taylor, 26, Jeannessa Caillean Lurie, 24, and Max Ryan, 26. The trio was slain inside a home on Chynoweth Avenue on September 16.
“Joseph Vicencio murdered three people. Three wonderful, beautiful human beings,” Santa Clara County District Attorney Jeff Rosen told reporters outside the courthouse Friday. “We charged the defendant with murder … he’s looking at spending the rest of his life in prison,” Rosen said.
Vicencio, 27, was also charged with domestic violence.
Just before 12:30 a.m. on Sept. 16, multiple 911 callers said they heard a woman screaming for help and the sounds of gunfire. “Officers arrived and located Tarrah Taylor in the front of the residence, bleeding profusely. Officers searched the residence and located two additional victims who were suffering from gunshot wounds,” Detective Christina Jize wrote in a police report.
The two female victims, Taylor and Lurie, were roommates who lived in the Chynoweth Avenue home, police said. Vicencio also lived in the home, Rosen said.
Just one day before her death, Taylor reported Vicencio to police for domestic violence, court documents show.
Taylor told police that Vicencio strangled her on Sept. 14, and he punched her in the stomach on Sept. 15. San Jose Police Department officers saw strangulation injuries on her neck and obtained a temporary restraining order, Rosen said.
On the same day that Taylor spoke to police, Vicencio told a witness that he “might be in trouble involving … Taylor and her roommate talking to police, and couldn’t have any ‘loose ends’ and people talking about him,” Jize wrote. The witness tried talking Vicencio out of killing anyone, the police report states.
SJPD officers asked Taylor on Sept. 15 if she would like to stay at a different location for her safety, Rosen said. “She declined that. He murdered Tarrah, Jeannessa, and Max the following day,” Rosen said.
After the triple homicide, Vicencio used the witness’ computer to search for information about “San Jose murders,” Jize wrote.
A second witness received a phone call from Vicencio seven hours after the killings. When the second witness confronted Vicencio about the homicides over the phone, Vicencio said there was an issue with a man at the apartment, but, “he handled it,” Jize wrote.
Ryan worked for the San Jose Housing Department as a Community Activity Worker. His union leaders wrote on X, “We are heartbroken that our Union brother, Max Ryan, was tragically taken from us at the age of 26. Every day he supported our community’s most vulnerable residents.”
Vicencio made his first court appearance Friday afternoon in the Hall of Justice. He has been in custody since his arrest on September 17.
“We have been very concerned about this defendant, Vicencio, for several years,” Rosen said Friday. In 2019, he fired a gun 11 times at MLK Library at San Jose State University, the district attorney told reporters. Prosecutors asked for Vicencio to be sent to prison for nine years because of the library shooting.
It’s unclear when Vicencio was released from custody following the 2019 shooting.
He is currently being held in custody and is charged with three counts of murder. “In this horrible and terrible case, the DA’s office will do everything in it’s power to make sure there is justice, to make sure (he) is locked up for the rest of his life,” Rosen said.
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