Background: News footage of Rolan Delacruz during his sentencing on Oct. 20 (KMVT). Inset: Dax Richins (Gooding County Prosecutor”s Office).
In a poignant address to his victim’s family, a teenager from Idaho, who admitted to committing murder, acknowledged that he deserved the full extent of his impending punishment.
Rolan Delacruz, aged 16, stood trial as an adult for the brutal 2024 murder of 18-year-old Dax Richins. Delacruz, along with his accomplice, 18-year-old Alexander Garcia, deceitfully lured Richins to an isolated location where they violently attacked him, ultimately dismembering and burying his remains. Garcia, who was 17 at the time of the heinous act, has also confessed to murder, receiving a sentence of 25 years to life on October 8.
This past Monday, Delacruz faced the consequences of his guilty plea. A judge in Gooding County sentenced him to a term of 23 years to life in prison, opting for incarceration in the Idaho Department of Corrections instead of juvenile detention.
As detailed in arrest affidavits obtained by ABC affiliate KIVI, Delacruz and Garcia picked up Richins from a library parking lot in Jerome on June 24, 2024, under the pretense of attending a bonfire. Instead, they drove him to a secluded area in Gooding County, where they assaulted him with brass knuckles and fatally stabbed him.
The following day, the duo returned to the scene, dismembered Richins’ body to hinder identification, and buried the remains in a shallow grave. Investigators later uncovered that Garcia had recorded Snapchat videos discussing the act of “physically deforming a human skull” and had texted a friend with a confession of the murder.
Further investigation revealed a bone in Garcia’s truck, which he reportedly kept as a “trophy.”
Richins’ skull was found in September 2024 on the Snake River Canyon rim. His body was not far away.
Richins’ father, Rodney Richins, was in the courtroom for the sentencing and said, “It felt so senseless to me how these young men could take the life of my son and not think of the consequences it would have on both my family and theirs. I can’t imagine what Dax was thinking when his friends turned on him, attacked him, and stabbed him to death.”
Before learning his sentence, Delacruz also read a statement to the court that expressed his remorse. The teen told the court, “Every night, I relive that night where [Alexander] and I killed Dax. Every night, I’m not able to go to sleep because of it. I know what I did was wrong, and not only wrong, but a little psychotic. I know you’re thinking, ‘Good, let him suffer.’ I agree with you. Let me suffer.”
Gooding County District Court Judge Rosemary Emory sentenced Delacruz to 23 years to life in the Idaho Department of Corrections.
Another defendant in connection with the case, 23-year-old Nathaniel Felix, previously pleaded not guilty to accessory to murder and destruction of evidence. He is scheduled to go on trial on Feb. 3, 2026.
