Four teens handed lengthy sentences in 2023 drive-by shooting death of 5-year-old girl

A judge handed down sentences Monday of 12 to 20 years in prison for four teenagers who admitted to their roles in the 2023 drive-by shooting death of a 5-year-old girl asleep in a Southwest Albuquerque mobile home.

Prosecutors said the four Albuquerque youths stole two cars, armed themselves with pistols and fired at least 10 gunshots into the mobile home, striking Galilea Samaniego once in the head.

Each of the four pleaded guilty to first-degree murder and were sentenced as adults, even though they were aged 15 to 17 at the time of the killing. All four sentencing hearings took place at the 2nd Judicial District Children’s Court.

“Sentencing in a homicide case like this never truly balances the scales of justice,” Judge David Murphy told each of the four at their sentencing hearings. “Galilea’s life is lost and nothing I do today does anything to restore that balance of a life lost for her family.”

The sentencings followed closely a raft of New Mexico killings allegedly involving New Mexico teenagers.

Three Las Cruces teens and a 20-year-old man face open counts of murder following a gun battle Friday at Young Park that left three dead and more than a dozen injured. And three Albuquerque teens ages 11-16 were charged with murder last week for allegedly using a stolen car to strike and kill a man bicycling to work in May 2024.

The four youths sentenced Monday included Jose Luis Ramirez, 18, and his brother, Alan Ramirez, 17, who each were sentenced to 20 years in prison. Murphy also sentenced Yahir Carballo, 18, to 16 years in prison and Alexander Barraza Venzor, 17, to 12 years.

All were sentenced as serious violent offenders, requiring them to serve at least 85% of their sentences before they become eligible for parole.

“If he goes to prison, he will not be the same person as when he went in,” Carballo’s attorney, Michael Rosenfield, said of his client.

“These are children who came out of traumatic backgrounds,” Rosenfield said. “They don’t think of consequences. It just doesn’t enter their minds due to the immaturity of the human brain.”

Assistant District Attorney Lawrence Hansen argued that the court already treats juveniles differently than adults, who face mandatory sentences of life in prison for first-degree murder. The plea agreements of the four youths sentenced Monday each called for a range of zero to 20 years in prison.

“We do take into account that juveniles are not fully developed,” Hansen said at Barraza Venzor’s hearing. “Juvenile homicides are homicides. They carry a lot of emotion but the loss is the same.”

Hansen said all four of the teens were armed the day of Galilea’s killing although not all fired gunshots at the mobile home. The gunman who fired the fatal shot is unknown, he said.

Albuquerque police detectives said the teens occupied two stolen Kia Souls seen entering the Vista Del Sol mobile home park around 5:48 a.m. on Aug. 13, 2023. Gunshots were fired from at least one of the vehicles toward a trailer at 2718 Paseo Del Canto Dr. NW.

Galilea was sleeping with her two sisters in a bedroom on the west side of the trailer when the fatal gunshot struck her head. The homeowner, who lived with her teenage grandson, had been babysitting Galilea, her two sisters and a fourth child when the shooting occurred.

The teenage grandson had once been friends with Jose Luis Ramirez but got into a fight in middle school over a girl that led to a years-long feud between them, police said at the time.

Prosecutors also said that four minutes after Galilea was shot, the same four gunmen engaged in a second drive-by shooting two miles away that targeted a home on the 1800 block of Delgado SW.

The homeowner, his wife and their 4-year-old son were not injured. A ShotSpotter alert indicated that around 25 shots were fired at the home.

Both the Kia Souls involved in the two shootings were reported missing from different West Side apartment complexes the night before the shootings, police said.

A day after Galilea’s death, police found one of the Kia Souls at a West Side address using the vehicle’s GPS. The second Kia was found torched at a remote location on the West Mesa.

Detectives learned through video surveillance that a red Dodge Nitro was the vehicle used to pick up the teens that were in the stolen Kia Souls, police said. Investigators used law enforcement databases to track the Dodge Nitro to Barraza Venzor’s mother.

All four teenagers have remained in custody at Bernalillo County Youth Services Center, the county’s juvenile detention lockup, awaiting their sentencings.

Members of the detention center spoke in support of Barraza Venzor on Monday and described him as a model resident.

“Mr. Barraza, I recognize that you are not a lost cause,” Judge Murphy said before sentencing him to 12 years in prison. “Galilea is dead. Her loss remains permanent. You will have an opportunity to build a life that she does not have.”