Font ResizeLAS CRUCES - There was a glimmer of hope Thursday for an O ate High School football player on life support after being brutally attacked leaving a party last weekend.
Three days after doctors told family that 18-year-old Jerry Zamarripa was brain dead, a test Thursday revealed some brain function, said junior varsity football coach Jaime Ramirez.
In addition, Do a Ana Sheriff's Lt. Michael Kinney reported late Friday night that one arrest had been made in Zamarripa's beating. Andrew Martinez, 24, of the 800 block of Alamendra Street, was in custody Friday night on two counts of aggravated battery with great bodily harm and one count of tampering with evidence.
Sheriff's investigators allege that Martinez retrieved a golf club from his vehicle and hit Zamarripa once in the body and twice in the head
Zamarripa's girlfriend, OHS graduate and track and field star Stephanie Grassel, reported the good news to Ramirez on Friday morning. With Zamarripa's parents and sister nearby, Grassel has remained by Zamarripa's side day and night, holding his hand and reading books to him, Ramirez said.
"There was still blood flow to the brain and still brain function - it could be very little, it could be a lot, but they said actual brain function," Ramirez said Friday after school. "They took him off the pressure medication for swelling for 48 hours. His fever broke. His (intracranial) pressure is still pretty high, in the 50s, but not in the 80s like it was, so good signs."
Doctors
Zamarripa was airlifted to University Medical Center in El Paso after party-crashers attacked him while he was leaving a party about 3 a.m. Sunday, hitting him with the golf club and stabbing 18-year-old Anthony Sena in the side.
The dark tale got even darker when Homero Avalos, 19, Myles V. Calderon, 17, and 16-year-old Johnny Ray Vallejos - reportedly friends of Zamarripa's - and Aaron Valdivia, 23, allegedly tried to take matters into their own hands and shot at least 10 rounds into a Mesilla Park mobile home where they thought one of Zamarripa's attackers lived - killing Julian Pe a Sr., a 57-year-old Vietnam War veteran who was watching TV as he waited for dinner. The four have been charged with first-degree murder. Memorial services will be held for Pe a on Monday evening, with a funeral Tuesday afternoon in Las Cruces, his son said Friday.
But Thursday's news has brought strength to family, friends and the hundreds of Las Cruces students pulling for the popular high school senior.
"We're not giving up on it," Ramirez said. "We're not going to quit. We're going to give him every chance in the world. Doctors don't know how he's lived this long on life support. They're kind of in awe. He keeps fighting and he keeps proving them wrong, so everyone's kind of keeping up hope; they were told originally he's brain dead."
After a difficult day of grieving and fearing the worst on Tuesday, Ramirez, a social studies teacher, said Zamarripa's continued survival has brought students and teachers together like never before.
"He's one of those kids who's a hard-working kid who's always got a smile on his face, always cracking jokes, lightening the mood a little bit. He didn't get a chance to play (football) a whole lot, but he never missed practice, worked hard to get eligible and stay eligible, stay around his friends. He's a real pleasure to have around," Ramirez said.
Alex Sena, Anthony Sena's younger brother, is a student of Ramirez's, and told his teacher his brother hopes to be released from the hospital today so that he can attend tonight's basketball game at O ate against Las Cruces High School. After the game, students have planned a candlelight vigil in support of Zamarripa's recovery, outside the school.
"It was somber at first," Ramirez said. "A lot of kids were very, very worried, especially when (some) thought he was dead ... I was just telling my kids, 'Don't perpetuate things you don't know. Don't repeat it. Just let it alone.'"
Martinez was being held at the Sheriff's Department for question Friday night, after which he was to be transported to the Dona Ana County Detention Center under a $100,000 cash only bond. The investigation is still ongoing.
Ashley Meeks can be reached at (575) 541-5462
On the web
•O ate High School has set up a webpage about the latest fundraising efforts for Zamarripa's and Sena's families at onate.lcps.k12.nm.us/jerry/J&S/jerry.html
•Donations are also being accepted at First Light Federal Credit Union to help the family of the man murdered by those allegedly seeking revenge for Zamarripa's beating. That account, No. 6734949, is under the name of Amanda M. Padilla, Pena's son's fiancée.
