SAN ANTONIO – An argument over the placement of hidden cameras in the apartment of David Villarreal’s drug dealer, Aaron Estrada, 29, was the beginning of a confrontation between Estrada and Villarreal that ended in Estrada’s death, prosecutors said.
Villarreal, 31, is on trial, accused of stabbing Estrada to death in the West Avenue apartment on Oct. 16, 2015.
Testifying in his own defense, Villarreal told the jury Thursday that fearing Estrada had a gun, he stabbed him in self-defense during the confrontation.
“He was choking me and I was scared that, I don’t know, that he could kill me,” Villarreal said. “I wasn’t thinking. I just reacted.”
He said he plunged a kitchen knife into Estrada seven times.
“It was a nightmare. That’s what it felt like,” Villarreal said. “I was just standing over him bloody with, like, blood all over me.”
Villarreal said that initially, Estrada was his drug dealer, but the relationship soon changed.
“We were romantic, sexual,” he told the jury. “I guess you can categorize it as, like, boyfriends.”
The trial will resume Friday in Judge Jefferson Moore’s 186th District Court, with Villarreal back on the witness stand for direct examination.
If he is convicted, he faces a maximum sentence of life in prison.