An Española woman will serve 18 months on supervised probation after pleading down to theft charges in a case where she was charged for beating a man with a metal pipe, stealing his phone and wallet and using his stolen debit card at Walmart for more than $500 because he refused to do a “drug run.”
Zara DePaula, 35, pleaded guilty on Nov. 17 to fraud over $500 and larceny over $500.
As part of the plea deal, charges of aggravated battery with a deadly weapon and conspiracy to commit fraud over $2,500 were dismissed. Her plea deal set her sentence at 18 months of supervised probation.
DePaula received credit for 129 days served. When she was first arrested in 2023, prosecutors sought to have her held without bail as a danger to the community. She was released, but then arrested four separate times in the case, every time on a bench warrant, after she kept failing to appear for court hearings.
Her former co-defendant, accused of all the same things. Camyelle Holmes, 46, of Española, is wanted on a bench warrant after she failed to appear for a district court hearing in her case on the same charges. Holmes is additionally charged with armed robbery.
Holmes has been wanted on a failure to appear warrant since Sept. 29.
What Happened
At the time of the incident on June 22, 2023, Española Police Officer Anthony Martinez wrote in a criminal summons that he was sent to the Lucero Center over reports of a man being beaten by others with a bat.
The two people who called it in said they saw the victim being chased from the park and up the stairs to the parking area by two men and two women.
When they caught up to him, they allegedly started beating him.
The man initially denied being beaten or that anyone took his wallet and phone. A short time later, he asked officers where his wallet and phone were, and then denied again being beat. A day later, he went to the police department and left a written statement about the beating and identified DePaula and Holmes as his attackers along with two men he didn’t know, Martinez wrote.
“(Man) stated that he and Camyelle began to argue because he didn’t want to do a ‘drug run,’” Martinez wrote. “(Man) further stated that during the altercation, Zara got into his pocket and took his phone and wallet.”
He found charges on his bank account for things he didn’t buy including $517 at Walmart. Martinez went to Walmart, checked the surveillance cameras and watched footage of DePaula and Holmes allegedly using his stolen card, Martinez wrote.