Prison term set in vehicle homicide case

Second trial brings driver 15-year prison sentence

SANTA FE — A Rio Arriba County man has been sentenced for a second time in a high-profile vehicular homicide case and will spend a lot less time in prison than he was originally given.

District Court Judge Jennifer Attrep sentenced Juan de Dios Cordova on Thursday to a total of 15 years for killing motorcyclist Mark Wolfe of Algodones and injuring Wolfe’s wife in a crash on the High Road to Taos on Memorial Day weekend in 2011. Cordova is left to serve about 8½ years since he has been in custody since his 2011 arrest.

Cordova was convicted for causing the crash and aggravated DWI in 2012 and was sentenced to 29 years in prison, but the conviction was overturned in June 2015 after the state Court of Appeals found that Judge Mary Marlowe Sommer should not

have admitted evidence that Rio Arriba County deputies obtained when they entered Cordova’s home shortly after the crash.

After a new trial in August, Cordova was found guilty of homicide by vehicle, two counts of great bodily harm and vehicle and leaving the scene of an accident.

When deputies entered Cordova’s home, which was not far from the crash site, they found Cordova drunk, as well as the keys to the truck he abandoned. Prosecutors had argued that the deputies had the right to enter the house because they had reason to believe that Cordova was injured.

But the Appeals Court found that the deputies did not have reasonable grounds to believe he might have been injured to the extent that they needed to immediately enter and provide assistance. All the evidence deputies got from the house was later suppressed.

Wolfe was the leader of the Duke City Drifters, an Albuquerque motorcycle club that was riding near Chimayó when Cordova’s truck ran into them. Wolfe’s wife, Debbie Hill, and another motorcyclist were also hurt.