Suspect, 18, is arrested in March killing in SE ABQ
A 29-year-old man was shot dead at motel on Central, near Louisiana
Detectives have arrested an 18-year-old accused of fatally shooting a man outside a motel in Southeast Albuquerque in March.
Yonnis Abreu is charged with an open count of murder in the March 23 death of Dylon Spiess, 29. He was booked into the Metropolitan Detention Center early Thursday morning.
It is unclear if he has an attorney.
So far, Albuquerque police have made 18 arrests in 65 homicides that have taken place so far in 2021.
According to a criminal complaint filed in Metropolitan Court:
Officers responded around 4 p.m. to a shooting at the American Inn and Suites on Central, near Louisiana. They found Spiess fatally shot on a secondfloor walkway. He died at a hospital.
The manager told police he heard a gunshot and found Spiess on the ground, but cameras may have captured the incident. Surveillance footage showed a man with distinctive tattoos and dyed blond hair running from the scene with a gun.
Detectives found a man match
ing the description of the suspect in Facebook photos of one of the hotel guests and traced it to Abreu’s profile. Then, during a separate homicide investigation at the hotel, police found a phone with a selfie of the suspect in its camera roll.
On June 30, the detective was conducting a separate investigation when he saw Abreu outside the Rags to Riches Smoke Shop, near Central and Wyoming.
Abreu agreed to speak with police, through a translator, and told them he had been staying with a friend at the American Inn and Suites.
When confronted with the photo from the surveillance camera, Abreu denied being involved.
“(Abreu) began to cry and became visibly upset as he was presented photos of him and his distinct tattoos and hair that matches the photo from the homicide investigation,” the detective wrote.
The officers told Abreu they “knew it was him and wanted to know what happened,” and Abreu requested a lawyer.
Prosecutors filed a motion to detain Abreu until trial, saying he had “no regard for the safety of the victim when he pointed a gun at him and shot him.”
“No one in our community should live in fear of coming into contact with a suspected killer,” the motion states.