Why was Louis Scherzer’s alleged killer on the streets of KCK?

On Tuesday, November 29, about 500 people stood at midfield under the lights at Bishop Ward High School’s football stadium. There was no game scheduled. The gathering was to mourn the death of Louis Scherzer, who had been gunned down two days prior outside Chicago’s Bar, at Sixth Street and Central in Kansas City, Kansas.

Scherzer, a 2005 Ward graduate, worked at the Board of Public Utilities, where he also served as a union steward. He was engaged to be married next fall. He was 29.

Scherzer’s family passed around a microphone, offering remembrances of Scherzer and thanking the crowd. “To think a young man of 29 years could have so much impact on so many people,” Scherzer’s sister said. She trailed off. A heavy silence moved in like a fog. In the distance there was a boom, and then several pops, and for the next eight minutes, fireworks shot up into the sky to the south.

Though Scherzer’s killing appears to have been essentially random, the circumstances surrounding it remain unclear. What is known: Scherzer was at Chicago’s Bar on the Saturday night after Thanksgiving. It was crowded. He left through the side door, in the direction of the alley that runs behind the bar.

An 18-year-old man named Efrain Gonzalez was sitting in a parked car in the alley. He was possibly hiding; according to Officer Cameron Morgan, a Kansas City, Kansas, Police Department spokesperson, Gonzalez’s car had earlier that evening been stopped by police for a minor traffic infraction. When the officer exited his vehicle and began walking toward Gonzalez’s car, its driver sped away. The officer didn’t pursue.

“That’s our policy and has been for several years now,” Morgan says. “We only pursue for violent felonies.”

It is so far unknown what, if anything, was said between Gonzalez and Scherzer when they encountered each other in the alley. But it ended, police say, with Scherzer being fatally shot, and Gonzalez sustaining a gunshot wound to the leg. Gonzalez then drove to the emergency room at the University of Kansas Medical Center. Police subsequently arrived at the hospital, located Gonzalez being treated for the wound, and arrested him in connection with Scherzer’s death. He has been booked and charged with first-degree murder. His bond is set at $1.5 million.

Though multiple sources have told The Pitch that Scherzer was armed, and that Scherzer and Gonzalez exchanged gunfire outside Chicago’s, Morgan says the department won’t comment on the source of Gonzalez’s gunshot wound yet.

“It’s possible he [Gonzalez] accidentally shot himself,” Morgan says. “We won’t know for sure until we’re further along in the investigation.”

The publicly available information about Gonzalez raises troubling questions about why he was not already in custody. Since he turned 18, in January of this year, Gonzalez has been arrested at least five times. On October 31, he was booked for attempted theft and criminal trespassing. In August, he was arrested for aggravated burglary.

Gonzalez was also arrested twice in February for crimes the Wyandotte County Detention Center website omits from its database. Asked what the nature of the February arrests were, Morgan directed The Pitch to the Wyandotte County Sheriff’s Office, which maintains the database. Multiple calls and e-mails to that office were not returned.

Odder still, none of Gonzalez’s arrests prior to Scherzer’s slaying resulted in charges from the Wyandotte County District Attorney’s office. Why not?

“That’s a question for the DA’s office,” Morgan says. “I’m told we sent the cases over. I don’t know if they just declined to prosecute, or what happened.”

Wyandotte County assistant district attorney Chris Schneider tells The Pitch that his office has brought one case against Gonzalez besides the recent murder charge. “It’s a juvenile case from 2014 — misdemeanor theft and criminal trespassing — and he was found guilty,” Schneider says.

What about the four other arrests from 2016, at least two of which were felonies? Schneider declined to specifically address those, but noted that there are many reasons why the DA’s office might not have charged Gonzalez for his various arrests, including an ongoing investigation or a lack of evidence.

“The standard for arrest is way different than the standard for conviction,” Schneider says.

What we’re left with are some basic facts that do not reflect well upon the criminal justice institutions of Wyandotte County. Louis Scherzer is dead. He was allegedly killed by a young man who had been arrested four times this year. After each of those arrests — including a violent crime — Gonzalez left the Wyandotte County Detention Center without being charged with a crime. And neither the DA’s office nor the police department appears willing to accept responsibility for never having built a case against Gonzalez — a failure that may have cost a life.

After the fireworks, the crowd at the Ward football field walked in a procession down Tauromee, up Grandview Boulevard, past St. Peter’s Cathedral Church, down Orville and back to 17th Street, finally arriving at the home of Scherzer’s parents. They carried flashlights and candles, a sea of light softly washing the streets of KCK. Outside the Scherzers’ red-brick house, everyone paused for another moment of silence. It was well past nightfall, but the lights illuminated each mourner’s face clearly. The vigil over, people began to walk away, back toward the school, quietly and in the dark again. 

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