Jury acquits on first-degree murder charge in 2013 killing

Jurors this week acquitted Jaycob Michael Price of first-degree murder but hung on other charges in an 11-year-old killing reopened as a cold-case investigation.

The 2nd Judicial District Court jury also acquitted Price, 32, of conspiracy to commit armed robbery in the 2013 shooting death of 26-year-old Julio Apodaca outside a Northeast Albuquerque apartment complex.

But jurors failed to reach verdicts on charges of second-degree murder, voluntary manslaughter, armed robbery and tampering with evidence, meaning prosecutors could retry Price on those charges.

The 2nd Judicial District Attorney’s Office said in a written statement Thursday that “as of now, we do intend to retry” Price.

Prosecutors allege that Price fatally shot Apodaca while robbing him of about $100 worth of prescription pills.

Jurors reached the verdicts Wednesday following a weeklong trial before Judge Courtney Weaks.

“We are thankful that our jury took the time to carefully and thoughtfully judge this case on the evidence presented by the prosecution,” Price’s attorney, Raymond Maestas, said Thursday in a written statement. “It is why the jury system is one of the pillars of our nation, and for good reason.”

Price was indicted in 2017 after an Albuquerque Police Department cold-case detective reopened the case.

Albuquerque police responded to a 911 call shortly before midnight on April 2, 2013, and found Apodaca lying next to a sport-utility vehicle outside an apartment complex in the 400 block of Fruit NE, near Broadway and Lomas NE.

The trial included testimony from Price’s father, Joe Price, who told jurors he saw his son fatally shoot Apodaca in the front seat of a vehicle.

Joe Price, 57, told jurors that his son asked him for a ride to the apartment complex.

The father said he waited in his truck while Jaycob Price entered the passenger seat of another vehicle. After several minutes, Joe Price said he approached the vehicle and saw his son shoot a man in the head.

After the shooting, they dismantled the pistol and threw the pieces in two locations, he testified.

Maestas told jurors that testimony by Joe Price contradicted that of other witnesses, raising doubts about the truthfulness of all the testimony.

“The state’s witnesses are all over the map,” Maestas said Tuesday in closing arguments.

Joe Price was indicted in 2017 on charges of first-degree murder and armed robbery in Apodaca’s killing. He pleaded guilty in March 2019 to conspiracy to commit armed robbery and faces up to three years in prison, court records show. His sentencing hearing has not been scheduled.

Prosecutors argued that cellphone records showed that Price and Apodaca exchanged numerous text and voice messages in the hours before Apodaca was killed.

The case prompted a 2020 ruling by the New Mexico Supreme Court allowing prosecutors to admit certain cellphone records as evidence in Price’s trial.