BAKERSFIELD, Calif. (KGET) -- Jose William Lara, found guilty in 2023 of killing a California City woman who disappeared more than a decade earlier, was back in a Kern County courtroom Wednesday after an appeals court reversed his murder conviction.

The 5th District Court of Appeal found a Superior Court judge failed to refer Lara for examination after evidence was brought forward that he may have an intellectual disability.

The case instead proceeded to trial.

Lara, 64, should have been referred to Kern Regional Center, according to a three-justice panel of the appeals court.

"We conclude the trial court was presented with evidence raising sufficient doubt that Lara was intellectually disabled and was thus obligated to appoint the regional center director, or the director's designee,

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