Man accused of killing woman hired as sex worker found competent for trial

A man facing murder and sexual assault charges in the death of a woman was deemed competent to stand trial on Wednesday.

In June, Jason Kendall told the Metropolitan Police Department that he choked Larissa Garcia for 10 minutes, had sex with her and then left. The incident occurred after Kendall had hired Garcia, who worked as a sex worker, authorities said.

Kendall had initially been found not competent in August and was sent to Stein Hospital for treatment.

In the months since, sex worker activists have honored Garcia’s memory and used her death as a call to action for what they say is a high rate of violence against sex workers and a lack of protection in a city they say is built on the backs of sex workers.

Several of the activists showed up to the courtroom on Wednesday wearing “Justice for Larissa Garcia” shirts with Garcia’s face on it. They were pleased that Kendall was found to be competent, though disappointed at the delay in proceedings.

“This should have been done five months ago,” Nina Nova, a member of the sex worker activist group Red Umbrella Collective, said.

At an Aug. 23 vigil for Garcia, activists called the initial competency ruling unfair, and said it halted justice. They cited the allegation in Kendall’s arrest report that he had initially called police saying Garcia’s death was an overdose. They alleged Kendall must have been competent enough to understand his actions then.

A hospital toxicology screening did not show any drugs or alcohol in Garcia’s system, according to the arrest report. Amy Merrell, executive director of Cupcake Girls, also noted that Garcia lived a sober lifestyle.

“It felt like a giant halt in something that wasn’t meant to be stopped,” Ivy Love, a member of Red Umbrella Collective, said. “It felt typical for anything that ever happens to us.”

On Wednesday, Kendall’s lawyer, Michael Castillo, told the judge he would be challenging the competency finding, and will return on Jan. 22.

The activists pledged to continue to show up in court.

“It’s all about keeping the pressure and just making sure he’s held accountable, and that the public knows that these things happen to us, and that justice is regularly denied to people like us,” Nova said.

Lack of protection for sex workers

Garcia’s death was a reminder to the activists of other sex workers who had been victims of violence. They have worked for years to move towards decriminalizing sex work, which they say would add more protections for people, like health care and the ability to report abuse.

“Sex work isn’t dangerous. It’s the way we treat sex workers,” Amy Merrell, executive director of Cupcake Girls said at August’s vigil.

She blamed bills such as the Fight Online Sex Trafficking Act and the Stop Enabling Sex Traffickers Act, which were passed by the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives in 2018 and signed into law by then-President Donald Trump.

The bills were designed to fight sex trafficking, but Merrell said they have only increased penalties for sex work and led to more violence. She added that fees and fines were forcing sex workers who wanted to get out of the job to stay in it to afford the bills.

Contact Katie Futterman at kfutterman@reviewjournal.com. Follow @ktfutts on X and @katiefutterman.bsky.social.