A man who shot a Marine Corps veteran at a West Side sport bar last year, leaving him\u00a0paralyzed from the chest down, has been convicted of aggravated assault and other offenses.<\/p>\n
Wilmer Vladimir Ruiz Ortega, 30, faces up to 99 years in prison when he is sentenced on a date yet to be determined.<\/p>\n
A\u00a0Bexar County jury convicted him Friday of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon causing paralysis, aggravated assault causing serious bodily injury and aggravated assault with a deadly weapon.\u00a0 He was found not guilty of aggravated assault of a security officer.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Prosecutors said\u00a0Ruiz Ortega fired six shots at security guard Jimmy\u00a0Friesenhahn\u00a0after Friesenhahn\u00a0discovered a weapon inside his pants while conducting a pat-down at the entrance to El Patio Sports Bar on May 4, 2025.<\/p>\n
Friesenhahn sustained two gunshot wounds in the chest and one in the neck, leaving him paralyzed from the chest down. Ruiz Ortega tried to leave the scene in a vehicle, but other security guards detained him until officers arrived, police said.<\/p>\n
The shooting was captured on security camera footage, which was shown to the jury. Friesenhahn, now 45, testified at the trial, speaking in a low, hoarse voice from his wheelchair.<\/p>\n
Ruiz Ortega has remained in the Bexar County Jail since his arrest. Jail records show he is being held under a federal immigration\u00a0detainer, indicating that federal authorities believe he is in the country illegally.<\/p>\n
The shooting drew national political attention. U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz shared\u00a0Friesenhahn’s story on X, writing, “My thoughts and prayers are with Jimmy Friesenhahn tonight, a Marine veteran and a Texan, who is fighting for his life after being shot by an illegal alien. His attacker never should’ve been in our country.”<\/p>\n
During the trial, defense attorney Alfonso\u00a0Otero argued that Friesenhahn’s search of his client was unlawful because\u00a0Friesenhahn lacked the authority to work as a security guard. Otero said Friesenhahn was not employed through a registered security company.\u00a0<\/p>\n
He also said the bar did not have a sign informing patrons that firearms were prohibited.\u00a0Missy\u00a0Castillo, owner of El Patio Sports Bar, testified that such a sign was posted inside the entrance.<\/p>\n
Court records show\u00a0Ruiz Ortega was arrested in 2020 on a charge of driving while intoxicated. The charge was later reduced to obstruction of a highway, and he was sentenced to deferred adjudication, a form of probation, in 2022. His probation was revoked in 2024 after he repeatedly failed to appear in court, and a judge later ordered him to serve 35 days in jail.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A man who shot a Marine Corps veteran at a West Side sport bar last year, leaving him\u00a0paralyzed…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":457190,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[82,84,83],"class_list":["post-457189","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-san-antonio","tag-san-antonio","tag-san-antonio-headlines","tag-san-antonio-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/457189","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=457189"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/457189\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/457190"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=457189"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=457189"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=457189"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}