Santa Fe County prosecutors are seeking the death penalty for two suspects in the July killing of Frank Segura, a 39-year-old Santa Fe man, The New Mexican reported.

According to court documents, prosecutors will seek the death penalty against John La Bombard, 35, and Justin Romero, 26, because Segura was killed in the commission of a kidnapping and because he allegedly witnessed a crime that the suspects wanted kept quiet, The New Mexican reported.

The killing was allegedly drug-related but wasn't over a particular drug deal, prosecutor Barbara Romo said in court documents.

La Bombard and Romero allegedly told police that La Bombard thought Segura was "going to be a rat or was a rat," that he thought Segura was giving information about him to the police, Romo said in the documents.

"That was the motive for the actual killing," Romo said. "They took him to the Santa Fe National Forest to get rid of him. That's what the evidence shows."

Romo said she didn't know if Segura actually was working with police, and Santa Fe Police Capt. Gary Johnson, head of the department's investigations unit, told The New Mexican he couldn't comment on whether Segura was an informant.

La Bombard has been charged with murder, conspiracy, kidnapping and tampering with evidence, while Romero is charged with murder and evidence-tampering, The New Mexican said.

Romo said the District Attorney's Office will pursue the death penalty against Romero even though he isn't thought to be the one who pulled the trigger but because he aided and abetted the killing and is equally culpable under the law, the paper reported.