Background: The Summit County Justice Center in East Basin, Utah (Google Maps). Inset: Francisco Santos-Morales (Summit County Sheriff”s Office).
Two days after Sandobal’s arrest, authorities took Santos-Morales into custody. In a twist straight out of a crime novel, the pair began blaming each other for the murder almost immediately upon their apprehension.
Details from an arrest report, sourced by local NPR affiliate KPCW, reveal that the drama began when Sandobal confided in Santos-Morales about purported abuse by her husband on March 25. The following day, Sandobal accused Santos-Morales of taking matters into his own hands by killing her husband.
However, the narrative took another turn when Santos-Morales offered a conflicting account to the police. He claimed it was actually Sandobal who “fatally struck” her husband, adding another layer of complexity to the already tangled case.
According to an arrest report obtained by local NPR outlet KPCW, Sandobal and Santos-Morales were in a romantic relationship when she told him on March 25 that her husband, who was not named, was abusing her. Police said Sandobal told them that Santos-Morales killed her husband the next day.
However, when police spoke to Santos-Morales, he told them that it was Sandobal who allegedly “fatally struck” her husband.
Sandobal allegedly told police that she and Santos-Morales both loaded her husband’s body into a Honda Civic and dumped him on the side of the road. Police said she told them that they could find the hammer that was used to kill her husband as well as a blood-soaked blanket in her apartment.
Police said an autopsy determined the man’s cause of death as blunt force trauma to the head. The manner of death was listed as homicide.
Both Sandobal and Santos-Morales were charged with desecration of a dead body and obstruction of justice. Neither of them was charged in connection with the man’s death. Their next court dates were not publicly available.
