Omar Cueva (State Police)
Officer Darian Jarrott. (State Police)
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — New Mexico State Police Officer Leonel Palomares had a bad feeling on that February morning as he and Officer Alfonso Montez waited along Interstate 10.
The two had been tasked with stopping Omar Cueva, a suspected drug trafficker who, Homeland Security Investigations had warned Palomares, was “paranoid” and carrying a rifle and large amount of meth.
The officers rehearsed the traffic stop before they heard a fellow officer, Darian Jarrott, had stopped Cueva instead. Within minutes, they learned that Jarrott had been shot and Cueva was headed their way.
Palomares suggested they set up spike strips.
Montez disagreed, saying they should try to take Cueva out because he had just shot Jarrott, had “no regard for human life” and “based on his criminal history.”
In the chaotic half-hour that followed, Cueva would exchange gunfire with both officers, along with a few other deputies and agents, before being shot to death.
Documents released by State Police late Friday detail the Feb. 4 pursuit and interviews with those who fired upon, and were shot at, by Cueva as he left a trail of spent shells between Deming and Las Cruces.
According to New Mexico State Police incident reports:
Palomares and Montez found Cueva “trying to blend in” with traffic on Interstate 10 near milepost 113 and the officers gave chase. He pulled onto the shoulder, and the officers pulled behind him. Cueva opened his driver’s-side door and fired at the officers as they took cover behind their vehicles.
Cueva then drove off, and both officers fired at the truck before pursuing him down the highway. As they were driving, Palomares said, he saw Cueva’s back window “exploding” and realized he was shooting at them.
The officers hung back and used the shoulder to avoid being hit by gunfire as multiple other agencies joined in, at times nearly crashing into one another as they pursued Cueva at high speeds.
Doña Ana County sheriff’s Deputy Diego Herrera told investigators he heard about the shooting of a Deming State Police officer and a pursuit of the suspect. Herrera said he called his brother, a police captain in Deming, and told him they would stop Cueva in Las Cruces.
As the pursuit got closer, pursuing officers relayed that Cueva was dodging spike strips and shooting at authorities as he drove by.
Herrera was waiting at mile marker 132.
As the pursuit approached, he noticed “a big gap” between Cueva and the officers chasing him. He jumped into the chase.
“He did not want this guy to get away. In Deputy Herrera’s mind, this guy needed to be stopped with whatever it took, he was going to be stopped,” one investigator wrote.
Moments later, Las Cruces police Officer Adrian De La Garza jumped in front of Herrera and Herrera had to swerve to avoid crashing into the officer.
De La Garza told investigators he was about to eat when he heard the dispatch that an officer had been shot. He said he turned up the radio and heard the suspect was on I-10 approaching Las Cruces.
De La Garza ran out of the station and sped toward the highway, planning to set up a spike strip. The officer saw that Cueva was already closing in and decided he needed to try to do a pursuit intervention technique on the truck.
As De La Garza got close he saw Cueva point a pistol out the back window and “was taking his time to try and aim” at him. De La Garza slammed on the brakes and swerved back and forth trying to dodge Cueva’s aim before Cueva opened fire.
Soon after, De La Garza said, he and Cueva both drove over spike strips and he heard “multiple shots” being fired from authorities on the side of I-10. The officer told investigators it sounded like his police car and Cueva’s truck were struck by bullets.
De La Garza said he saw Cueva slump over the wheel as if he had been shot and he seized the opportunity to do a PIT maneuver on the truck. Cueva lost control of the truck, and De La Garza assumed he would be “one step ahead” of Cueva once they came to a stop.
That wasn’t the case.
De La Garza fought back tears as he told investigators that, by the time he put his car in park, Cueva was already standing at the front of his hood holding a pistol.
The officer jumped out of the car and fired at Cueva before being shot in the arm.
De La Garza told investigators he fell to the ground and thought he was done for. He pushed that thought out of his mind, telling himself, “Don’t give up.”
The officer stood up and fired at Cueva, who then backed up behind the truck bed.
De La Garza said he saw Cueva’s head over the truck bed and approached him, firing until his gun was empty. By the time he reloaded and “took a deep breath” Cueva was motionless on the ground.
De La Garza said he then felt like “his body was on fire” and realized he could not move his arm. He had been shot through the biceps.
His police car had been shot numerous times, and bullet casings littered the highway.
Inside Cueva’s truck, authorities found a shopping bag filled with several packages of a crystal-like substance, an Aero AR-style .223 rifle with a skull emblazoned on the side and a handheld Whistler radio scanner. Bullet casings from a pistol and rifle were strewn about the truck and there were loaded rifle magazines on the floor.
Near Cueva’s body was a Century Arms Canik 9mm handgun and on Cueva, they found a bag of a crystal-like substance and a blood-soaked $20 bill with a bullet hole through it.
At Cueva’s house in Deming, authorities found a shotgun, multiple types of ammo, a bag of pills, a digital scale, six cellphones and more than $1,000 in cash.
Authorities learned that Cueva’s wife, Laura Swanquist Chavez, had shown up to work “distraught” after he had called her that day.
The wife told investigators she and Cueva had met a year ago after she and her mother moved to Deming from California due to “too many people dying from COVID-19 in her town.” Cueva was in a halfway house at the time and told her he thought of “changing his life and starting a family.”
She said the two began dating, got married and have a 7-month-old son. She described the relationship as “a loving one.” The wife said Cueva had “anger issues” and could be jealous but never abused her.
Swanquist Chavez said they struggled with money as Cueva worked construction before leaving his job so the couple could start a business selling cars and “merchandise.”
She told investigators Cueva would smoke marijuana to relieve “severe headaches” and he would often “leave without notice or telling her what he is doing.” Swanquist Chavez said Cueva insisted she buy a handgun from a local pawnshop because there are a lot of “coyotes and wild animals” around their house.
She said Cueva received phone calls on Feb. 4 and “was in and out the house.” “They had made plans to spend time together, but she noticed he was gone,” an investigator wrote. “She also noticed that the box and the handgun were also gone.”
When investigators told Swanquist Chavez her husband had been killed in a shootout with authorities, she “became emotionally distraught and was unable to continue the interview.”
"Hour" - Google News
April 25, 2021 at 08:08AM
https://ift.tt/3dML5Xa
A HALF-HOUR OF CHAOS - Albuquerque Journal
"Hour" - Google News
https://ift.tt/2WcHWWo
https://ift.tt/2Stbv5k
Bagikan Berita Ini
0 Response to "A HALF-HOUR OF CHAOS - Albuquerque Journal"
Post a Comment