Valentino Cash Amil, who is facing murder charges after running over and killing 74-year-old Dannielle Spillman with his car at the intersection of South Van Ness and Mission on April 13, will remain in county jail until his preliminary hearing, San Francisco superior court judge Lianne Dumas ruled on Friday morning.
“I am finding, by clear and convincing evidence, that there is no less restrictive means at this time to ensure the public safety and to compel court attendance, other than the defendant remaining in custody for now,” said Dumas. “I am denying your motion for release today.”
Earlier in the hearing, Amil pleaded not guilty to all charges.
Amil’s attorney, Seth Morris, argued that Amil understood the severity of the charges against him and he had remorse for what happened. Furthermore, he added, Amil is a family man with strong community ties and no criminal history, which makes him unlikely to commit another crime, or attempt to flee the area and avoid prosecution if he were released.
Amil, he continued, had merely perceived the septuagenarian Spillman, who walked to the front of Amil’s car and exchanged words with him, as a threat to his family, and acted in a moment of panic to protect them.
Morris added that he had found that multiple people had filed restraining orders against Spillman over the last three decades.
Amil would not have known this on April 13, however, when he ran over Spillman with his car.
Mission Local discovered a temporary restraining order Amil filed in 2024 against two men from San Jose. Among other alleged threats, Amil wrote that the men had told him they’d run him or family members over with a car.
Both Amil and the alleged aggressors failed to appear at a hearing on March 21, 2024. The request for a restraining order was dismissed without prejudice.
In court today, Judge Dumas was not convinced by Morris’ claim that Amil feared for his life. Even if the 74-year-old Spillman appeared threatening, she said, that did not justify running her over with a car.
Amil’s behavior after hitting Spillman was also a strong reason to keep him incarcerated, Dumas said. “The fact that the defendant … did stop at the scene and then, even after surveying the scene, chose to leave when there were reasonable alternatives, also causes me concern about the ability of the defendant to follow court orders and to return to court for future proceedings.”
In a video of the incident, Spillman, who is on foot walks in front of Amil’s car, which is blocking the sidewalk. They briefly exchanged words before Amil accelerated rapidly, first hitting Spillman and then running her over.
Additional footage, said city prosecutor Edward Mario, shows that Amil pulled into the gas station at South Van Ness Avenue and Mission Street after running over Spillman, parked and waited there for about a minute and a half, before fleeing at the sound of sirens.
“We hear a siren and then immediately see the defendant jogging back to his car — he absolutely fled the area,” said Mario. “He knew what he had done. He knew he had run over somebody, and he was afraid of submitting to authority.”
Amil was arrested not long after in Potrero Hill, added Mario, which meant that he was driving in the opposite direction from where he lived.
As Dumas read her resolution, Cash Amil burst into tears as he yelled “I’m sorry,” extending his arms towards family members sitting behind him in the courtroom.
As sheriff’s deputies walked Amil out of the courtroom, his family, also in tears, extended their arms toward him.
“My grandson is innocent,” yelled an older woman, in tears outside the courtroom.
“It was an accident.”
Amil’s preliminary hearing is set for May 6. The defendant will have another opportunity at that time to request a motion to be released.
It was clearly not an accident. The surveillance video shows it was 100% intentional. There’s no logical way to justify what he did. Anyone with half a brain would see that.
And just like that the narrative that vehicle homicide suspects aren’t prosecuted evaporates.
A new late night drunk loudmouth enters the arena. Welcome my brother/sister/otherly-gendered-sibling.
You aren’t going to argue the point, just call names?
I’ll let you be the only one doing that here.
Enjoy yourself I guess.
Even if he really feared this elderly pedestrian, he could DRIVE AWAY.
Dannielle, sadly, could not.
Keep Amil locked up.
“Even if he really feared this elderly pedestrian, he could DRIVE AWAY.”
Did you watch the video? As the article states, Spillman positioned himself directly in front of the vehicle, effectively blocking Amil in and preventing him from entering the road. So he could not “drive away”. He was trapped by Spillman.
I am not saying that justifies Amil’s subsequent action. But it was risky and aggressive behavior by Spillman, and could cause some nervous drivers to feel like they were trapped and vulnerable.
If you feel trapped and vulnerable by an elderly person outside your vehicle then you shouldn’t be driving at all. Give up your license. All he had to do was let her walk. That’s it. You don’t kill people just because you’re mad at them.
Unless his car did not have a functional reverse gear, it is ridiculous to suggest that he was in any way trapped.
From my viewing of the video, the vehicle was pulling out onto the highway from an off-road location. So there was nowhere to reverse to and only one way out.
Spillman could have just let the vehicle leave and then proceed along the sidewalk. Instead he decided to wander out into the road and block the vehicle’s exit. Why would any reasonable person do that?
Hey Ben.
You’re getting a lot of details wrong, but the most jarring is that you don’t seem to know the gender of the victim. What’s going on with that?
pedestrians have the right of way in california. the street is not a highway, it is an urban street with a speed limit of 25mph, and any driver who ran over someone that slowly did it intentionally.
Spoken like a true Car Brain. Exhibit A for the next person who wants to write about how cars ruin cities
What do you think you will accomplish by making these trollish remarks? If your aim is anything other than acting like a misanthropic nuisance now would be a good time to explain.
Lpe, you misunderstand. I already stated that the driver is at fault. The very fact that he is facing a murder charge and is being held on remand shows that, since that almost never happens with a traffic accident.
I was pointing out that Spillman’s behavior was also far from impeccable and contributed to the incident. And that may give the driver an affirmative defense such as self-defense or false imprisonment, as the article is indicating.
And that in turn increases the chances of a plea bargain for a lesser charge such as manslaughter or reckless indifference. Either way this driver is going to prison.
There’s no shade tree lawyering about plea bargains or various possible charges or whatnot. Even assuming good faith I advise you to think carefully and say what you mean, especially when discussing a tragedy like this. Thanks for responding anyway.
Well of course, the driver was blocking the entire sidewalk! Where else should she have gone? The victim blaming continues…
There are some truly evil empty-souled people in this city. Some of them even have spouses and kids.
The easiest way to identify them is by how they drive their cars – they show it every day, speeding through stop signs and red lights, blowing past you as you try to cross the street. And most of the time they get away with it because we’ve normalized sociopathic behavior behind the wheel. But Valentino Amil couldn’t help but reveal his true violent and sociopathic self that day, and decided to execute an old woman for spilling water on his luxury car. Here’s hoping the legal system doesn’t screw this up and keeps this murderer in jail where he belongs.
100%
“Accident” my foot.
there is simply no way that was an accident. what a vile thing.
He not only hits her, he DRAGS her before her body disengages from his car.
But he’s sorry! Yeah, sorry he got caught. Sorry there are finally consequences for his bad behavior. Sorry he is likely to spend many years in prison, where he belongs. There is absolutely no excuse for what he did. If you’re in a car and feel “threatened” by an elderly pedestrian who is justifiably mad that your car is on the sidewalk, just get in your car, lock the doors, and drive the fuck away. It’s that simple.
Anil had the equivalent of road rage except that the other person was not in a vehicle. He made a very, very, very bad impulsive decision. Spillman’s actions were not the best of ideas either. Anil’s act was intentional, but I doubt that Anil was trying to kill the victim.
“Anil’s act was intentional, but I doubt that Anil was trying to kill the victim.”
What an absurd statement – are you his lawyer? Anil made the conscious decision to fully run over an old woman with his car and then flee the scene. That is clear intent to kill, full stop. Why do certain people insist on defending murderers just because their weapon of choice is a car? What is this mental sickness that makes people normalize and accept unspeakably violent behavior with cars that would never be accepted in any other context?
It doesn’t matter if the driver was trying to kill the victim. Do you understand that this is literally the difference between manslaughter and murder? Man, Car Brain is a hell of a drug.
Glen, Warren has a point here. A murder conviction requires proof that the perp intended to kill the vic. This incident certainly was not Murder One, since that implies premeditation and the random and freakish nature of this incident rules that out.
So Murder Two. But even that requires proof of intent to kill. That is going to be hard to prove. Which is why I suggested upthread a more appropriate charge might be manslaughter, reckless endangerment, depraved indifference or assault.
Jenkins is a fair-minded DA and certainly does not treat criminals as victims. The driver is going down. But nothing is to be gained by filing charges with such a high burden of proof that the perp could end up walking.
Driving a car directly at a pedestrian should be considered the same as shooting a gun directly at a person.
But I guess you’re right, in America we give so much cover to cars and drivers that it may well be difficult to get a murder 2 conviction.
BS. If there’s evidence of intent then there is, and it there isn’t there is not. It’s determined by a jury who reads into the case on all the relevant facts.
It has little to do with the method, the political considerations happen at the DA’s discretion or not.
Pretending vehicular homicide isn’t a charged crime is nonsense.