[CCA] N.M. jury convicts man in Halloween 2010 death

CARLSBAD, N.M After only an hour of deliberation Monday, an Eddy County District Court jury found Gilbert Melendrez Jr. guilty of vehicular homicide and five other charges against him in the 2010 Halloween night death of Leora “Jean” Dyess.

Melendrez was remanded to the Eddy County Detention Center, where he will remain until the court-ordered pre-sentence report is completed and submitted to the court.

Assistant District Attorney Ray Romero said he expects Melendrez will be sentenced within 30 days.

The 24-year-old Dyess was killed as she crossed the street with a group of young trick-or-treaters that included her own two children.

The trial for Melendrez began on Feb. 13 and continued through Monday, when the defense presented three more witnesses before both sides delivered their closing arguments.

As the jury filed in with its verdict, Melendrez solemnly stared straight ahead and showed no emotion as each count was read, followed by the pronouncement “guilty.”

In addition to vehicular homicide, the jury returned guilty verdicts on knowingly leaving the scene of an accident resulting in death; tampering with evidence; failure to provide immediate notice of accident; driving on a revoked license; and child abuse.

Prior to the verdict being read, Judge Freddie Romero cautioned everyone in the courtroom to refrain from any emotional outbursts and asked that everyone leave in a courteous manner.

After the trial was adjourned, Romero said he was pleased with the outcome.

James Dyess, whose son, Noble Dyess, was married to the victim, spoke on behalf of his family, James Dyess said he, too, was “very pleased” with the jury’s verdict.

“Mr. Romero did an excellent job in presenting his case,” James Dyess said. “The Carlsbad Police Department also did a good job. This has been hard on my family. My son lost his wife and a big part of all of us. Jean was a fine young lady, a good wife and mother.”

Prosecutor Romero told the jury during opening statements Feb. 13 that the case was to some degree based on circumstantial evidence in the fact that no witnesses could say they saw Melendrez driving.

However, the prosecutor said all the other evidence that has been gathered showed that Melendrez was the driver of the vehicle that hit Dyess and that he was driving in excess of 50 mph in a 30 mph zone on a revoked license.

The second day of trial included witnesses who saw a red truck with tinted windows strike Jean Dyess as she threw her own youngest child out of the way and pushed to safety the others she was shepherding across the street.

In the third day of trial, Jean Dyess’ mother-in-law Carla Dyess recounted how she went to the Carlsbad Police Department 11 days after the incident and, from a photo line-up of six people, identified Melendrez as the driver of the vehicle that night, adding that his face was “burned in her mind” after she saw him through the open driver’s side window.

Carla Dyess was with Jean Dyess as she walked the group of children, including her own two daughters, across the street to a neighbor’s house the night Carlsbad observed as Halloween. Carla Dyess told jurors that a red pickup truck came over the hill on West Greene Street and struck Jean Dyess, brushing Carla Dyess with the mirror on the driver’s side. That’s the moment she said she saw the driver’s face.

Although he didn’t get on the stand to testify, on the fourth day of trial, prosecutors played a jail interview of Melendrez with his family from Nov. 27, 2010.

“That girl shouldn’t have been in the (expletive) street. You don’t trick-or-treat in the (expletive) street,” Melendrez said in the recording, while Dyess’ family sat silently in the court room.

Later in the Nov. 27 recording, Melendrez said that when he got out of jail, he would take a “dummy or a doll” to the spot on West Greene Street (near Elm Street) where Dyess was hit and come over the hill in the area and hit the doll.

“I am going to do my own forensics and (expletive). I watch ‘CSI’ (television show). I ain’t stupid,” Melendrez said on the tape.

On the fifth day of trial, the defense argued that Melendrez had lent his truck to a friend at the time of the crash, but Able Parraz Jr. said he had been in Orla, Texas, on an oilfield job until returning late in the evening to Carlsbad. Testimony from Parraz’s girlfriend and cell phone tower records solidified Parraz’s alibi. 

Articles by Current-Argus staff writer Matlin Smith contributed to this article.