Two men have been sentenced to life in prison plus 18 years for the 2019 murder of a Meadow Lake father.
On Wednesday, Dec. 14, Jesus Angel Garcia, 35, of Peralta, and Alexandro Motelongo-Murillo, 27, of El Paso, were each sentenced to a life sentence for first-degree murder, plus nine years for attempted murder and nine years for conspiracy to commit murder.
The sentences will be served consecutively — one after the other. The defendants must serve at least 30 consecutive years of their life sentence before they can be considered for parole, but they will also have to serve the 18 years before that can happen, for a total of 48 years in prison.
Garcia and Motelongo-Murillo have been in custody since March 2019 and will receive credit for time served.
On March 2, 2019, the two men went to Daniel Sandoval’s Meadow Lake home on Prados Place and began shooting while Sandoval and his brother were working on the house.
The brothers fled in Daniel’s car with the two men pursuing them in a gray SUV. The chase continued through the neighborhood, ending on Meadow Lake Road with Sandoval slumped over the steering wheel of his car.
At trial, prosecutors said Garcia and Motelongo-Murillo sprayed the car with gunfire, and continued shooting at Daniel’s brother as he ran from the car.
The two men were found later that night, hiding in a ditch in Bosque Farms, but at that time, Garcia and Motelongo-Murillo hadn’t been connected to the shooting.
They were released and went to El Paso, Texas, where they were later taken into custody at a hotel on March 7.
The day Sandoval was killed, his widow, Tanya, who was nine months pregnant with their son, and her daughter were at the store.
Photo courtesy of Tanya Sandoval
Last week, a Valencia County jury found two men guilty of the 2019 murder of Daniel Sandoval, 26, left. His widow, Tanya Sandoval, right, was nine months pregnant when he was killed.
A panicked phone call from Daniel sent them racing home, but it was too late. He was taken to an Albuquerque hospital, where he died from his injuries before Tanya could see him.
When she addressed the court last week, Tanya invited 13th Judicial District Court Judge Cindy Mercer to walk with her down memory lane, telling the judge about she and Daniel’s first meeting to their last days with each other.
“At the end, I asked her — told her — I understand the jury did find them guilty, but me and my son, daughter, mother, brother and family, we’re the ones who are going to do the life sentence,” Tanya said during a phone interview on Monday. “They aren’t.”
While addressing the judge, Tanya held back a great deal of her hatred and anger toward the two men who murdered her husband.
“I did my best to be respectful to her, since it’s her court,” she said. “I asked her to hold them accountable for their actions. They knew what they were doing; it was planned from the beginning. Maybe as they serve their sentence, they can sit and think about what they did.
“They took someone’s life, whether they thought it was for a good reason. They took my husband from me.”
After nearly five hours of deliberations on Thursday, Nov. 10, a Valencia County jury found Garcia and Motelongo-Murillo guilty of first-degree murder, conspiracy to commit first-degree murder and attempted first-degree murder.
“I’m happy with her decision. Not a lot of people in New Mexico get that,” Tanya said. “I told her, one day, I hope to at lest get to tell my son we got justice for his daddy in a way.”
Born a little more than a week after the shooting, Daniel — named for his father — will only know his father through pictures and stories told by his mother. There is also a single video of his father.
“It’s of my husband talking to our son, talking to my belly. It’s the only conversation he’ll ever have with his father,” Tanya said. “This was the final step. It’s not closure; I’ll never leave him in the past. Now we try to have as normal a life as possible. Every year, it gets harder, not easier.”
Looking to the future, there’s really only one thing that scares Tanya — telling her son how his father died.
“I’m scared. I regret that my son is hurting and will hurt. At least I can tell him the story that we didn’t give up. We pushed and had some help and put these guys away for what they did,” she said. “I hurt for the families that didn’t get justice.”
Tanya said she hopes Garcia and Motelongo-Murillo will come to understand the pain and sorrow they caused, but if not, “there will be another judgment some day. There’s no forgiveness in my heart right now.”
Julia M. Dendinger began working at the VCNB in 2006. She covers Valencia County government, Belen Consolidated Schools and the village of Bosque Farms. She is a member of the Society of Professional Journalists Rio Grande chapter’s board of directors.
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April 18, 2024
