APD charges man involved in robbery, police shooting in Northwest ABQ

Police released the name of a man who allegedly robbed a convenience store, fled from police and was shot by officers in a vacant lot in Northwest Albuquerque on Sunday.

Gabriel Moralez, 23, of Albuquerque, is charged with armed robbery, aggravated assault, false imprisonment and resisting, evading or obstructing an officer.

Moralez is being booked into the Metropolitan Detention Center, Albuquerque Police Department spokesperson Gilbert Gallegos said in a news release at 5:50 p.m. Monday.

At about 3:10 p.m. Sunday, APD received an alert from a cash tracker — a GPS tracking device that allows police to track stolen money — inside the Circle K convenience store in the 300 block of Coors NW, near Bluewater, according to a criminal complaint filed in Metropolitan Court.

Two minutes earlier, a store employee called dispatch and told them he had been robbed at gunpoint, police said. The employee told police a man — later identified as Moralez — walked up to the door and yelled, "Mask, mask mask," the complaint states.

The employee told police after they told Moralez he could not wear a mask inside, he pointed a gun at them and said they had to give him money from the register or he would shoot them, police said. The employee told police Moralez left with $140 in cash, eight packs of cigarettes and the cash tracker, according to the complaint.

The tracker traced Moralez to the 200 block of 63rd Street, near Central, where detectives conducted covert surveillance, police said. Minutes later, they saw Moralez walk in the area of 60th and Avalon SW where they contacted him and he ran, the complaint states.

Moralez then jumped over a fence carrying a black backpack and ran through a vacant property on Westcourt Place then "produced a handgun and officers shot a rifle" and less lethal rounds at Moralez, Gallegos said. After being shot, he ran again before being arrested and taken to a local hospital, Gallegos said.

In March, Moralez pleaded not guilty to criminal trespassing after hanging out in an alley outside a Southeast Albuquerque apartment, according to court records. He was ordered to enter a pre-adjudication diversion program, court records state.