Man pleads to lesser charge in girlfriend's 2019 beating death and is set free

A man initially charged with first-degree murder in the 2019 beating death of his girlfriend entered a plea to a lesser charge Thursday and was ordered to be released from jail.

Mark Guerro, 51, pleaded no contest Thursday to aggravated battery resulting in death and was sentenced to four years in prison under the terms of a plea agreement.

Under the agreement, Guerro received credit for the 4½ years he has served in the Metropolitan Detention Center. Second Judicial District Judge David Murphy ordered Guerro’s release on Thursday.

Guerro’s girlfriend, 36-year-old Judith Apache, was admitted to a hospital in May 2019 after she was beaten so severely that doctors had to remove part of her skull to relieve pressure on her brain. She died about two weeks later.

At a sentencing hearing Thursday, members of Apache’s family expressed dissatisfaction with the plea agreement and Guerro’s release.

“Mark Guerro may seem content and not dangerous to anyone, but that is because he doesn’t have access to drugs or alcohol,” Apache’s sister, Rhonda Williams, said at a sentencing hearing Thursday. “Being in jail helped him stay clean, but once he is released, my family will be in distress knowing he’s out.”

The 2nd Judicial District Attorney’s Office spokeswoman Nancy Laflin said prosecutors decided they could not proceed with the original charges of rape and murder.

“Unfortunately, this case had causation and evidentiary issues that made it difficult to go forward with the original charges,” Laflin said in a written statement. “That’s why our office offered the plea it did.”

Assistant District Attorney Collin Brennan said the terms of the plea and sentencing agreement left him with little to argue in the hearing.

“I hope (Guerro) takes this very seriously,” Brennan said. “He has the opportunity to get away from alcohol, get away from drugs. He can become a good father. It’s not too late.”

Guerro made a brief statement in Diné (Navajo) but the translation was not audible in the virtual hearing.

Guerro’s attorney, Douglas Wilbur, did not immediately respond Thursday to a request for comment.

Family members told the judge that Apache had a troubled relationship with Guerro that predated her fatal beating.

About a year before her death, Apache was hospitalized with severe head injuries after a fight with Guerro on the tribal lands of To’hajiilee, Williams told the judge.

Williams said her sister suffered severe memory loss and didn’t remember the June 2018 beating. Apache refused to believe that Guerro had injured her and resisted the family’s efforts to separate the couple.

“I was heartbroken with disbelief and disgusted with myself because I could not prevent Judy from being with Mark (Guerro),” Williams told the judge.

Williams was granted full custody of the couple’s young daughter in 2018 “due to violence in the relationship,” Bernalillo County Sheriff’s deputies wrote in a 2019 arrest warrant affidavit.

Williams also said that Navajo Police didn’t make a report to do a follow-up investigation after the 2018 beating.

Bernalillo County Sheriff’s deputies who investigated the fatal beating in 2019 said Guerro told deputies he repeatedly struck Apache with a belt.

When Apache got angry, Guerro said, he hit her and “doesn’t remember how many times,” according to the affidavit. Guerro also told deputies he sodomized Apache with a broomstick.