Ventura County – When you have a hankering for a grilled chicken-and-bean burrito that leads you to your neighborhood fast food emporium in broad daylight, you don’t expect to become witness to a violent fight that leads to the death of a 16-year-old high school football player. But that is apparently what took place at 5:00 p.m. on Monday, August 31st in the parking lot of a Camarillo Taco Bell.
According to Ventura County Sheriff’s Department spokesman Capt. John Reilly, a 911 Emergency call reporting a violent altercation among several male individuals brought deputies to the Flynn Road restaurant location. As law enforcement arrived on the scene, “both groups of males dispersed”, including a 16-year-old male suffering from stab wounds.
Deputies subsequently learned that the stabbing victim had been “driven to a local hospital,” where he was listed in serious condition. An investigation into the incident immediately ensued, including a community outreach by law enforcement via a video interview posted on Dropbox.
As the investigation progressed, on September 1, the stabbing victim “died at the Ventura County Medical Center as a result of the injuries he received during the altercation,” and the VCSD Major Crimes and Camarillo Special Enforcement Unit continued to work the case. The product of that work led to the identification of Tyler James Ostertag, a 20-year-old from Camarillo.
Ostertag was soon thereafter located “at a motel in Riverside,” where he was contacted and arrested. He was then transported to Ventura County Jail where he was booked on a charge of murder, with his bail set at $1,000,000.
Photo: Courtesy Ventura County Jail Booking
