RAYMONDVILLE — Willacy County prosecutor Juan Angel Guerra stumped a presiding judge and attorneys for clients as high up as Vice President Dick Cheney when he failed to show up to court on his own grand jury’s indictments.

The no-show infuriated attorneys who’d spent the day milling about with what they’d hoped would be slam-dunk motions to quash the cases.

And it put Presiding Judge Manuel Bañales in a position he said he’d never been in before.

“At the very least I expected the district attorney to be here,” Bañales said, asking Guerra’s office manager, “Do you know where he is?”

The manager, Hilda Ramirez, was subpoenaed by defense attorney J.A. “Tony” Canales when buzz circulated in the courthouse that Guerra was nowhere to be found.

Canales summoned Ramirez to act as representative for Guerra in hopes the motions could go forward.

She told the judge she had been trying to reach Guerra all day.

When Bañales asked if she were concerned for Guerra’s safety she said she would not know how to answer the question.

Guerra’s cell phone message box was full much of the day, but an assistant who answered the line late Wednesday said he was not ill.

Bañales said he would not hear the motions without the state present and set arraignments for Friday morning.

He allowed all defendants to waive court appearances and appear via their lawyers and set a jury to be called Dec. 8.

“The State of Texas is entitled to have its day in court,” he said.

Guerra, a 53-year-old Rio Grande Valley prosecutor who drew national attention for suing counterparts in the county justice system and staging a protest with barnyard animals, long has alleged high-ranking corruption in the deals that brought the impoverished county a $60 million immigration detention center.

On Monday, he got a grand jury to sign off on a slew of indictments including an acceptance of honorarium charge against state Sen. Eddie Lucio Jr., and an engaging in organized criminal activity charge against Cheney and Gonzales.

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