Police arrest third suspect, unseal records in shooting death of 11-year-old

As they drove away from Isotopes Park, Froylan Villegas’ mother heard a boom.

She looked out her window to see a man hanging out the sunroof of a black SUV, holding a large rifle. He fired it over and over, moving the gun from side to side as 14 bullets tore into their truck.

The next thing she noticed was her son, 11-year-old Froylan, slumped over in the front seat and then her niece, Tatiana Villegas, said she had been shot and “could not move.”

The mother, holding her 3-month-old baby, jumped out of the truck and frantically tried to flag down passersby for help. The black SUV, meanwhile, sped toward Interstate 25 and into the night.

On Friday, Albuquerque police filed charging documents after they arrested the third suspect in the shooting — a case of mistaken identity — that left Froylan dead and Tatiana Villegas paralyzed. Both had been shot at least five times.

Jose Romero, 22, Nathen Garley, 21, and Daniel Gomez, 26, are each charged with an open count of murder, shooting from a vehicle, conspiracy and child abuse charges in the Sept. 6 incident in Southeast Albuquerque.

Police have not said who fired the shots from the SUV.

All three have criminal records, mostly for drug-related and non-violent offenses, but federal authorities say Garley and Romero are involved in fentanyl trafficking.

Court records unsealed Friday show the suspects ran into a rival gang member at the Isotopes baseball game — someone they had reportedly traded bullets and barbs with for months. They then waited for the man, who was with children of his own, to leave and knew what type of truck he drove.

Police say it was the same model of truck the Villegas’ drove and the one Romero, Garley and Gomez targeted by mistake.

Froylan’s death marked the second time a child was shot in less than a month in Albuquerque and spurred Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham to declare gun violence a public health emergency, enacting a short-lived ban on carrying firearms publicly in Bernalillo County along with other measures.

The governor thanked the law enforcement agencies and officers involved in the case after the third arrest was announced on Friday.

“I join my fellow New Mexicans in continuing to mourn the senseless loss of another young life from gun violence,” Lujan Grisham said in a statement. “These tragedies are becoming all too common in New Mexico, and I will not rest until we’ve used all the tools at our disposal, at every level of government, to prevent something like this from ever happening again.”

With the arrest of Gomez, all three men were in custody by Friday afternoon.

Federal authorities arrested Garley on Sept. 13 after he was pulled over on Interstate 40 with 22 pounds of fentanyl, according to court records. And Albuquerque police arrested Romero on Thursday at an Allsup’s convenience store, finding a gun and fentanyl pills on him.

None of the suspects’ families could be reached for comment on Friday.

Gang rivalry

Police were doing traffic control outside the Isotopes game when they heard gunfire around 9 p.m. Officers followed the sounds and found a white truck riddled with bullets on Avenida Cesar Chavez, just west of University.

Froylan Villegas was already dead, having been shot five times, once in the head, and Tatiana Villegas was taken to a hospital with several gunshot wounds.

Surveillance video showed a black Dodge Durango made a U-turn and sped through a red light to pull alongside the Villegas and a man fired at the truck from the sunroof, according to the criminal complaint filed in Metropolitan Court. Froylan’s mother told police they had “quality family time” at the game and “no fights or unpleasant interactions.”

Police said she told them they left a little early at the request of Froylan, who wanted to see his father as they planned to train horses the next day.

A photo of the black Dodge Durango Hellcat was released by Crime Stoppers and tips began to come in, identifying the suspects as “Risk” and “Blik.”

Further tips linked those monikers to Romero and Garley and said they had gotten into an altercation with another man at the game, according to the complaint. Police spoke with the man — who has a long criminal history and is currently on probation — but he denied being in any altercation.

Police said they soon learned the man was lying.

Surveillance footage from the Isotopes game showed Romero, Garley and Gomez watching and following the man, who was with his girlfriend and children, according to the complaint. At some points, the man appeared to try to go confront the three, but his girlfriend stopped him.

Detectives searched the social media profiles of the man and Romero and Garley Gomez and found numerous messages about the ongoing rivalry, sent in the weeks leading up to the shooting.

Police said in one message, a woman told the man that Romero pistol-whipped her multiple times to try to learn where he lived. In another message, Garley taunted the man’s brother — saying he had recently shot at their mother and forced the whole family to “up and move.”

In a post put up two days after the shooting, the man told Garley and Romero: “Wrong truck dumb (expletive),” according to the complaint. On Sept. 10, Romero posted on Instagram that he was trying to sell his Dodge Durango Hellcat for $30,000.

At a media briefing on Thursday, Albuquerque Police Chief Harold Medina said detectives had still not found the black SUV and that it may possibly have been painted white.

On Sept. 13, Garley and his girlfriend were pulled over while heading back from Arizona on I-40, near Grants, according to federal court records. Authorities found 100,000 fentanyl pills in the car and said Garley had tried to cover his neck tattoos with makeup.

When federal agents searched Garley’s girlfriend’s phone, according to the complaint, federal agents found a message that had been sent to her: “You know (Garley) killed that little boy. You were at that game huh? How can you sleep at night?”

The agents passed that information to Albuquerque police.

Criminal histories

Court records show Garley and Romero have not been charged with a violent crime before, and Gomez only had one domestic violence arrest in 2016 after allegedly hitting the mother of his child.

Most of the charges the trio has faced are drug-related and, according to court records, they appear to have been involved in fentanyl trafficking over the past few years.

During the investigation, a DEA agent reached out to detectives to say they were targeting Romero in a drug trafficking investigation. The agent identified Gomez as the third suspect in the stadium footage and said he knew Gomez “very well.”

In 2021, Gomez was caught with 1,000 fentanyl pills and told police he sold the pills, according to court records. He was initially charged with trafficking but prosecutors offered Gomez a deal and he pleaded guilty to possession.

A judge sentenced Gomez to a year and a half of probation, which ended in May.

Jose Romero was first charged with a crime — escape from the custody of the New Mexico Children, Youth and Families Department — in 2019, according to court records. He and another teen “walked away from” the Boys Reintegration Center in Albuquerque after leaving through a window.

That case was dismissed.

Then, in 2020, court records show Romero was arrested when he ran from a truck that tried to avoid a DUI checkpoint. He told police he had a warrant for armed robbery but no records of it can be found.

Romero was given pre-adjudication diversion and the case was dismissed.

Months later, Romero was found in a vehicle with two guns, fentanyl pills and cannabis, according to court records. A warrant was issued for his arrest in that case and was still active when he was arrested this week.

Romero picked up an additional charge on Thursday when the officer who was taking him to jail allegedly found 16 fentanyl pills and $1,000 in Romero’s pocket.

And Garley had only one previous case in his criminal record.

In October 2019, police responding to a nonfatal shooting in Downtown Albuquerque were told the suspect was wearing all black with neck tattoos.

Officers found Garley — with neck tattoos and wearing all black — in the area with a gun in his waist, according to court records. Police said they learned Garley was “not the offender.”

Court records show Garley told police he was working security for a Downtown business and grabbed his gun to respond to the shooting. Police tagged Garley’s gun into evidence along with “a substantial amount of cash” found on him “for safekeeping.”

Garley was charged with unlawful carrying and negligent use of a deadly weapon.

The officer noted that Garley “does not have a valid concealed carry permit.”