Man charged in South Valley double slaying from 2024

A man is accused in an apparent shootout that left two men dead and another injured last year at a home in Southwest Albuquerque.

Israel Tijerina, 43, is charged with an open count of murder and tampering with evidence in the Oct. 20 deaths of Isaiah Montoya, 24, and Ernie Estrada, 48.

Tijerina was booked into the Metropolitan Detention Center on Wednesday.

It appears that Tijerina had accomplices, according to court records, but no one else has been charged in the case. Much of the motive for the shooting and how it played out remained unclear in charging documents.

An online obituary for Montoya, a father of twin boys, said he was named after the prophet Isaiah from the Old Testament. The obituary said he enjoyed painting and riding motorcycles.

“Even though Isaiah’s life was cut short he had many adventures,” the obituary states. “... ‘The best remembers the best’ was what Isaiah would say.”

The Bernalillo County Sheriff’s Office responded to the shooting around 1:30 a.m. in the 1200 block of Atrisco SW, south of Bridge, according to a criminal complaint filed in Metropolitan Court. Deputies found Montoya’s body by the front door and Estrada’s body in Montoya’s bedroom, handguns were found near both men.

Deputies said multiple bullet casings from a rifle were found at the gate of the property near a phone, which belonged to a man who was shot at the home but driven to a hospital.

When deputies tried to speak with the man, who had been shot in the mouth, he wrote “lawyer” on a piece of paper and refused to help detectives, according to the complaint. Footage from home security cameras showed several people arrived in a white pickup truck and went inside before leaving 10 minutes later.

Deputies said two people who came in the truck, but did not leave with the others, matched the description of Estrada and the man shot in the mouth. A woman came forward to say she had been with Montoya that night when two men wearing ski masks came into his room with a bat.

The woman told deputies the men told her to leave “because it had nothing to do with her” and she didn’t know what happened next, the complaint states. Detectives found a message on Montoya’s phone from a woman threatening to kill him.

Deputies said on Nov. 26 a Rio Arriba County deputy contacted BCSO to say he stopped a white pickup truck in Española hours after the shooting, the occupants being the woman who threatened Montoya and Tijerina. The license plate on the truck matched the partial plate description given by a witness to the shooting.

The woman was let go but deputies arrested Tijerina, the driver of the truck, and he was eventually booked into MDC on a warrant from a 2022 drug possession charge in Albuquerque, the complaint states. While at MDC, Tijerina called the woman who had threatened Montoya and asked “did I do good?” and she told him he “is a hero” and she was “happy for what he did.”

During the call, according to BCSO, Tijerina asked if the man who was shot in the mouth “was mad” and the man was “then heard on the phone making mumbling sounds attempting to talk.”

Deputies said they searched the truck and found 10 ounces of methamphetamine, a handgun, rifle clips and ammunition that matched the caliber and brand of casings found outside the home, according to the complaint.

“The circumstances surrounding the shooting are still unknown to affiant and detectives,” the complaint states. “... For the above-mentioned facts, affiant believes probable cause exists to arrest Israel Tijerina in reference the crimes of murder and tampering with evidence.”