Judge: Accused killer will stay in jail
Bond denied to 26-year-old Santa Fe man charged in fatal stabbing of girlfriend, injuring two others
A judge ruled Tuesday that a Santa Fe man accused of killing his girlfriend and injuring two strangers at a southwest-side apartment complex last week is too dangerous to be released on bond while he awaits trial.
Christopher M. Garcia, 26, allegedly beat a neighbor with a crutch, fatally stabbed his girlfriend of five years, then stabbed a passing bicyclist as Garcia was fleeing the Zepol Road apartment complex June 22, according to Deputy District Attorney Susan Stinson, who argued that Garcia should remain jailed.
Selena Valencia, the 21-year-old woman who police say Garcia killed, had “at least 14 distinctive stab wounds to both sides of her torso,” Stinson said, and a stab wound in her face.
Garcia, dressed in a tan-colored inmate jumpsuit, sat silently, chin on chest, during his detention hearing Tuesday, not even lifting his head to look at family members who sat in the gallery behind him. Deputies led Garcia away after District Judge T. Glenn Ellington ruled that no conditions of release could reasonably protect the community from him.
Ellington asked during the hearing if Garcia — whose brief criminal history includes a DWI conviction and a report of assault on a household member — had been impaired at the time he is accused of committing the crimes.
Stinson said she didn’t know. She said neighbors whose home Garcia allegedly entered unannounced before he stabbed Valencia — a visit that ended with Garcia allegedly beating one of the home’s occupants with a crutch — told police that Garcia was acting “odd” and seemed “out of it,” but nothing else was known about his mental state.
Stinson said Garcia had enough presence of mind after allegedly committing the crimes to alter his appearance, hide his weapon and hide in bushes for hours.
Stinson said Garcia also made “statements indicative of guilt” when told by police that Valencia had not survived his attack on her, saying he had just ruined his whole life and “I’m going to spend the rest of my life in prison.”
The prosecutor also said that when police briefly left Garcia alone in an interview room he tore a piece of plastic off the wall and tried to cut his wrists.
Stinson said the District Attorney’s Office intends to pursue an open count of first-degree murder against him. She said Garcia faces 53 years in prison if convicted on all pending charges, which include aggravated battery and tampering with evidence.