Prosecutors are seeking to push out the trial date for a Chimayó man who’s been charged with first degree murder for a Dec. 29, 2024 shooting death, because the state laboratory still hasn’t processed some DNA evidence.
Raymond Romero, 35, is being held without bail on charges of first degree murder, possession of a firearm by a felon and possession of a controlled substance for the death of Jonathan Cordova, 40.
Jury selection is currently set for Feb. 16. Romero was arraigned in the case on Feb. 17, 2025, making the proposed trial date a year after the clock started ticking on the case.
Prosecutor Stu de Haan asked the judge in a Dec. 19 motion, to push the trial date out.
In January 2025, items were submitted to the New Mexico State Police lab for DNA testing, but the reports for that evidence aren’t done yet and they will “add to the complexity of the case,” de Haan wrote in a motion to push jury selection beyond February.
“(The) previous continuances were granted because of outstanding DNA evidence that are crucial to both plea negotiations and the State’s presentation of evidence at trial,” de Haan wrote in the motion, which is opposed by Romero’s defense attorney.
Pre-trial interviews started “in earnest” in July and all interviews with key witnesses are done, excluding the DNA experts, because the DNA analysis isn’t done yet, he wrote.
Prosecutors have been “diligently” contacting the state lab for updates, including before each status hearing in the case.
“In order to expedite the analysis, this Jury Trial was set per the policies of the laboratory,” de Haan wrote.
Despite the rush that the jury trial should have put on the evidence, the state lab employees told de Haan there isn’t enough time to get the testing done by the mid-February trial date because of, according to the forensic scientific supervisor, time off for the holidays and the training schedule.
According to the court docket, the scheduling order setting trial for Feb. 16 was filed on Dec. 3.
“This matter was assigned to Eve Tokumaru on December 11, 2025,” de Haan wrote. “She is to begin the process when she returns from holiday leave. The State believes that this is necessary evidence because of the facts and circumstances of the case.”
The DNA evidence is required for a “fair trial on the merits” and de Haan does not want to “invite appellate error by forcing this case to trial prematurely,” he wrote.
Romero’s attorneys, Ian Jump and Shellie Ann Patscheck, opposed the motion on the grounds that Romero is being held without bail, after District Judge Jason Lidyard found him to be a danger to the community in January 2025, following a dangerousness hearing, De Haan wrote.
The Case
State Police Agent Ezequiel Esquivel-Mata wrote in an affidavit for an arrest warrant that the initial call came in from Cordova’s girlfriend and that Cordova was being transported to the hospital by his aunt. Medics met them halfway and transported him via ambulance, where he was pronounced dead.
She told State Police investigators that Cordova went with Michelle Martinez and Ray Dominguez to buy crack cocaine in the evening and came back with it 20 minutes later and one of them said that Romero would be called to kill Cordova if he didn’t pay $10 he owed to Michelle Martinez, Esquivel-Mata wrote.
The girlfriend and Cordova came up with the money and paid Raymond Romero at Joe Romero’s house. The following day, at 8:45 a.m., she heard two gunshots outside of their trailer and someone yelling “Ray!” When she went outside, she saw Cordova running toward their trailer, with blood all over his chest and stomach, Esquivel-Mata wrote. She saw Raymond Romero, Emilio Montoya and Marcos Romero get in a black truck and leave. As they left, they crashed into a fence, , Esquivel-Mata wrote.
State Police interviewed Montoya, on Jan. 7, 2025, who allegedly said there was talk at Marcos Romero’s house on Dec. 28, 2024, of a disagreement between Martinez, Raymond Romero’s sister, and Cordova, over a $10 drug debt, Esquivel-Mata wrote.
“Emilio recalled hearing Raymond say, ‘where’s the (expletive) he is gonna get it,’” Esquivel-Mata wrote.
Montoya told investigators that the next day, he and Raymond and Marcos Romero drove to the store to get breakfast supplies and one of them said that Cordova was “gonna get what he deserves.” When they got to Marcos Romero’s house, Cordova approached the truck and Raymond Romero allegedly shot at him twice, before Raymond Romero yelled for him to get back in the truck, then sped away, crashing into a fence in the process, Esquivel-Mata wrote.
The house where the drugs were allegedly bought, on County Road 87, is the same one, and involves the same people, as a case in March, where Marcos Romero and Joe Romero were charged with kidnapping and rape for allegedly luring a man to Joe Romero’s house to trade vehicle parts for drugs. The man was then brutally beat and raped.
Charges in that rape case were dropped against all but one person, Felix Lewis, after the victim died. Lewis pleaded down to drug possession charges.