A Nevada resident has been sentenced to life imprisonment for the fatal shooting of his estranged wife in 2023.
Roidan Mendoza, age 40, received his sentence on Wednesday for the murder of Marillorky Tamayo Cruz, as reported by 8 News Now. For further details, you can read the full article here.
During the sentencing in Las Vegas, Clark County Deputy District Attorney Corey Hallquist stated that Mendoza was seeking “vindication” after a family court ruling awarded Cruz the family residence and primary custody of their children.
“He’s angry about losing control and wants to exact revenge,” Hallquist remarked.
The tragic event unfolded in August 2023 at the home of the victim’s mother, located in the Destinations Spring Valley complex in Las Vegas.
Following a court decision mandating child support payments, Mendoza initially returned home and severed the gas line to the family stove. He then proceeded to his mother-in-law’s apartment and fired 11 shots through a locked door.
Once inside the apartment, he found the victim in a bedroom and delivered “an execution-style shot to the forehead,” prosecutors said, per the Las Vegas Review Journal.
In the midst of the attack, Mendoza injured the former boyfriend of Cruz’s sister, and injured Cruz’s mother.
Cruz’s then-14-year-old daughter was also injured in the attack after stabbing Mendoza in the back, in an attempt to protect her younger sister.
“The only thing I could do, that I was thinking, was, I had to protect what I had left,” Cruz’s daughter, now 17, told the court Wednesday. “So I grabbed the knife on the ground, and I was planning to kill him because why would I let a man that killed my mother live?”
“I am not a tall person, nor was I strong. I was a 14-year-old girl trying to defend myself and my family.”
On August 25, Mendoza pleaded guilty to murder with use of a deadly weapon, but contended that the killing had not been “a premeditated homicide.”
“He knows he shouldn’t have lost control,” Chief Deputy Special Public Defender Charles Cano said. “But unfortunately, he did lose control. He didn’t want this to happen, he never wished it did, but being upset and angry and injured, he entered into this red zone of emotions.”
The prosecution played two 911 calls to the court. During one of the calls, Cruz was heard frantic before two gunshots rang out in the background.
While one bullet hit her shoulder, the other bullet fatally struck her in the head.
“The defendant at no point in time during this case has shown any due regard and respect for the sanctity of life,” Hallquist argued.
District Judge Michelle Leavitt sentenced Mendoza to life in prison without the possibility of parole.
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