Police: Fatal robbery netted $49
Seven arrested in connection with Edgewood slaying
Police say Michael Pelkey was killed for $49.
The 12-year employee of Smith’s was staffing the Fuel Center in Edgewood on Feb 11, police say, when seven people staged an armed robbery at the Southern Santa Fe County business off N.M. 344.
According to New Mexico State Police, the heist went down like this: Veronica Martinez, 30, and Eileen Sandoval, 48, watched the attendant’s booth from a car in the parking lot on that Sunday afternoon. When Sandoval discovered the door to the booth was unlocked, she called in a second car.
Around 4 p.m., police say, Daniel Gonzales, 29, Daniel J. Martinez, 30, Morgan Ramirez, 30, Misty Nevarez, 29, and Donald Gregory, 46, pulled up.
Gonzales, wearing a red bandana around his face and holding a semiautomatic Tec-9 handgun, entered the booth, investigators say.
Pelkey was with a customer at the time, state police suspect, when Gonzales grabbed cash from the register while the 62-year-old attendant had his back turned.
Undeterred, Pelkey followed Gonzales to the parking lot, where the pair got in an argument before Daniel Martinez shot him, police say. Pelkey, 62, died of gunshot wounds en route to the hospital.
The total amount taken in the robbery, according to state police, was $49.20.
Over the weekend, police announced they had arrested six of the seven suspects in the armed robbery. Around 1 a.m. Tuesday, police said, they caught the final suspect, Daniel J. Martinez, the alleged shooter, at a house in Southeast Albuquerque.
Daniel J. Martinez was charged with first-degree murder, armed robbery, tampering with evidence and being a felon in possession of a firearm.
Court records show he pleaded guilty to trafficking narcotics in 2013 and faces separate, pending felony charges of receiving or transferring stolen motor vehicles and possession of methamphetamine. Gonzales, the alleged robber, faces the same charges as Daniel J. Martinez in connection with the Edgewood incident. According to his court history, Gonzales pleaded no contest to attempted robbery in 2008 and was also charged with being a fugitive from justice while facing crimes in Texas.
The other five suspects also were charged with first-degree murder, armed robbery and tampering with evidence.
Details about how the suspects knew each other, and why police suspect they conspired to rob the rural gas station, remain unclear.
The suspects range in age from 29 to 48 and are all from Albuquerque, except for Gregory, who is from Edgewood. And court histories show each has been charged with a number of crimes in the past.
Gregory pleaded guilty to criminal sexual penetration of a minor under the age of 13 in 1995 and has faced charges of failing to register as a sex offender and shoplifting.
Nevarez pleaded guilty in 2007 to felony conspiracy to traffic a controlled substance and has faced shoplifting charges.
Veronica Martinez faces a pending charge of unlawful taking of a motor vehicle and has pleaded guilty to felony drug posession.
Ramirez (aka Kimberly Lynn AbneyWest, aka Steven D. Sanchez, according to court documents) faces felony charges of forgery and identity theft, and was out on bond in a separate armed robbery case at the time of the Edgewood incident.
Sandoval pleaded guilty to aggravated assault with a deadly weapon in 1993, has faced numerous DWI charges, and is facing separate forgery charges.
Had the heist been successful, according to information in a press release, the suspects would have made off with $7 each, plus 20 cents.