STOCKTON, California — A Stockton family and community are still searching for answers from a Christmas Eve murder 20 years ago.
Sophia Ulloa was stabbed to death outside her mother’s Stockton home. She was 20 years old and her car was full of Christmas presents for her then 4-year-old daughter.
The case remains unsolved.
At the very same place where the rime happened 20 years later, the pain is visceral.
"I’ve just been holding it and holding it," Tina Mendoza, Sophia's mother, said.
Sophia needed to run a last-minute errand for her daughter Jasmine.
"That night she wanted to go Christmas shopping for her. She found a scooter for her," Mendoza said.
Sophia told her best friend Lisa she would take a raincheck on their plans to hangout.
"She was going to call me when she got home," Mendoza said.
Mendoza went to bed but screams from outside woke her up.
"When I came outside, Sophia was standing behind her car holding her side saying, 'Go get him I’ve been stabbed.' Instead of running to her. I ran back to the house," Mendoza said.
Mendoza called 911. When she went back outside a neighbor was there to hold Sophia. She was now on the ground.
Stockton police began their search for a suspect. A light-colored Ford Thunderbird or Mercury Cougar was seen leaving the area at the time of the murder. Their only witness was Sophia who died shortly after being rushed to the hospital.
Detectives found Sophia lying next to her car bleeding profusely. Her car was full of Christmas presents for her daughter. They do not believe any presents were stolen.
"They pronounced my daughter that she did not make it. I would like to know who did this and why. It doesn’t get any easier. It gets harder and harder," Mendoza said.
"I’m home when I get the call and all of a sudden I’m out in freezing cold and being told what happened," Ed Rodriguez, one of the lead detectives at the time with the Stockton Police Department, said. "I’ve been at a lot of scenes. But this is kind of surreal. It was personal. At the time of the year this happened, and she seemed to touch a lot of people in a lot of different ways."
Rodriguez helped establish a $50,000 reward for information in conjunction with the governor's office on July 13, 2001. That reward has gone unclaimed and is still available today.
He now leads the cold case unit for the San Joaquin County District Attorney’s office, but said this case is a difficult one.
"I always assumed the answer would be right around the corner. Every time I took one step forward and two steps back," Rodriguez said.
He says most of the people interviewed gave bad information, which lead detectives down unnecessary paths.
"It’s been 20 years because of that," Rodriguez said.
Lisa Orosco, Sophia's best friend at the time, told ABC10 about a suspicious phone call made to Sophia days before she was murdered.
"That day something was off. Something wasn’t right. I kept asking what’s going on," Orosco said. "The night before someone called her and said that someone would kill her."
Rodriguez never had information about the call Sophia told Lisa about.
"There’s no doubt in my mind that there’s someone out there aside from the actual suspect that knows something about this," Rodriguez said.
Every Christmas Eve is a reminder this case is unsolved. Mendoza said she doesn't look forward to celebrating Christmas because of the reminder her daughter
"When you open up the trunk and see Christmas presents it gets to you. It got to all of us," Rodriguez said.
"Every day I think about my daughter, I think about why and how come," Mendoza said. "Sometimes I can feel the pain that she went through."
"She was loved by everybody. She was such a good girl," Orosco said.
Anyone with information can remain anonymous and send a tip to the Stockton police department. If you have any information about the murder of Sophia Ulloa, please contact District Attorney Investigator Eduardo Rodriguez at (209) 953-7728 or email at Eduardo.rodriguez@sjcda.org.
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