Mora County man pleads guilty to 2019 murder

Mora County man pleads guilty to 2019 murder

From the Las Vegas Optic

One day before a Mora County man was set to go on trial for murder, attorneys reached a plea agreement.

Alex H. Pacheco, 25, pleaded guilty to shooting and killing Jermain R. Jennings of Rio Rancho on Sept. 28, 2019, in Mora County. Jennings’ husband, Ben Montoya Jr., also of Rio Rancho, was wounded during the shooting.

In addition to the charge of second-degree murder, Pacheco pleaded guilty to felony aggravated battery causing great bodily harm and a felony count of shooting at a motor vehicle resulting in personal injury. A felony charge of tampering with evidence and a misdemeanor charge of negligent use of a deadly weapon will be dropped if the terms of the agreement are met.

Sentencing will take place within the next 90 days, according to Fourth Judicial District Attorney Tom Clayton. Pacheco will first undergo a diagnostic evaluation by the New Mexico Corrections Department.

Pacheco faces a minimum of five years in prison, with a maximum of 14 years, and would be subject to two years on parole upon release from prison, under the terms of the plea agreement. He is currently on house arrest.

“He’s been ordered to turn himself in on Wednesday morning, and he is to be transported to the department of corrections in Los Lunas,” Clayton said. “They will do an evaluation, and then we’ll get a report.”

Clayton said evaluations can take up to 60 days to complete, but are typically completed sooner. The purpose of the evaluation is to determine the best treatment options for help with things like substance use or mental health.

Pacheco was arrested Oct. 1, 2019, and booked into the San Miguel County Detention Center on a $200,000 cash-only bond. During a Nov. 4, 2019, hearing in Fourth Judicial District Court, Pacheco’s bond was lowered to $100,000, requiring him to pay 10 percent of the amount before being released.

Pacheco posted bond on Nov. 7, 2019, and was released from SMCDC but placed on house arrest until trial. A trial had been scheduled to begin Oct. 27, 2020, but it was rescheduled in late September.

Under the agreement, Pacheco will receive presentence confinement credit for time served in SMCDC and while on house arrest. According to Clayton, that equates to about 22 months.

The day of the shooting, Montoya had received a number of text messages from Pacheco — who is Montoya’s nephew — and in many of those texts, Pacheco was “calling him names,” according to an amended criminal complaint filed in Mora Magistrate Court in October of 2019.

After traveling to Mora from Rio Rancho to visit family, Jennings and Montoya went to Pacheco’s apartment around midnight on Sept. 28. Montoya told police that when he and Jennings knocked on Pacheco’s door, Pacheco said, “I don’t want to talk,” then began shooting, according to court records.

Investigators with New Mexico State Police found a bullet casing in the driveway at Pacheco’s apartment, and another casing was found inside the apartment. Police also located a trail of blood near the driveway, court records show. The vehicle Montoya and Jennings had traveled in was parked in the driveway, and officers found bullet holes in the windshield, as well as another bullet casing near a windshield wiper.

Jennings was shot three times, according to the amended criminal complaint. He died later at a hospital in Albuquerque. Montoya was also transported to a hospital with a gunshot wound, but was later released after receiving treatment in an intensive care unit.

Pacheco had claimed self-defense, according to Clayton, but Clayton said evidence showed that neither Jennings nor Montoya posed a threat to Pacheco. Both men were sitting in a vehicle when Pacheco fired at them, according to Clayton.

“It was clear from the physical evidence and the testimony from one of the witnesses—and from a neighbor—that this was not self-defense,” Clayton said. “What prompted Alex to shoot? We’ll never know — only Alex knows that. But it was not self-defense.”