Alamogordo man charged in murder of girlfriend

A grisly discovery by Otero County Sheriff’s Office deputies conducting a welfare check has led to an open murder charge against Matthew Weems, 31, and a petition by prosecutors to keep him in custody through his trial.

It began on the morning of Nov. 17 with a service call about a burglary in progress at a residence on Spanish Daggers Drive, near U.S. 82 in Alamogordo. Deputies stated in an affidavit that they arrived to find Weems kneeling in the roadway and detained him.

A resident told officers he had confronted Weems on his front porch and, as Weems walked away from the property, found the hood of his pickup truck open. Deputies said a container of diesel fuel that had been secured in the cargo area was sitting next to a vehicle connected to Weems, and that personal belongings had been left inside another vehicle on the victim’s property, leading deputies to arrest and charge Weems with two counts of burglary of a vehicle, a fourth-degree felony.

Weems was transported to a hospital, per charging documents, after exhibiting “suicidal behaviors.”

Meanwhile, Weems’ father was worried about Weems’ girlfriend, Lucinda Rios. He was caring for the couple’s infant child, he told authorities, reporting she had not called to check on the child and was not answering her phone. He requested a welfare check at her home, located in a trailer community five miles away from Spanish Daggers Drive.

Deputies were granted access by the facility’s management, per an affidavit, and they soon discovered Rios in her bathroom with signs that she had been stabbed multiple times. A black folding knife reportedly sat on a countertop nearby. An investigator estimated she had been dead for several hours.

According to witness interviews, the couple had had breakfast together with Weems’ parents the previous day.

Weems was escorted from the hospital to the sheriff’s office and interviewed. The deputies’ account does not indicate that he made any confession, but says an inspection of his person — executed under a search warrant — showed scratch marks on his back as well as scratches and cuts on his fingers. He allegedly explained a laceration to this thumb as an injury sustained while “working on cars.”

Weems has been charged initially on an open count of murder, with a grand jury set to consider an indictment in December. Prosecutors with the 12th Judicial District Attorney’s Office will seek pretrial detention for Weems at a court hearing scheduled for Wednesday. He is also scheduled to appear in court over the vehicle burglary charges early next month.

A public defender representing Weems could not be reached Monday.