Posted on 01/15/2004 4:21:51 PM PST by SwinneySwitch
He was an illegal immigrant masquerading under suspect's name
Jose Guadalupe Martinez came to America from Mexico eight years ago to make a living. To that end, he bought stolen identification papers and changed his identity to Jose Zuniga, U.S. citizen. In late December, he decided not to be Jose Zuniga any more, even though it meant going back to Mexico.
Consider the alternative. Jose Miguel Zuniga of Corpus Christi, whose Social Security card and identification Martinez used all those years, is a wanted man. He is indicted, in absentia, in the Sept. 6, 2003, prison gang-related slaying of Daniel Pena at a ranch south of Taft.
Martinez found this out the hard way.
For the past several years, Martinez had been using Zuniga's identifiers to work in Arkansas. Two years ago, he was stopped on suspicion of drunken driving. He used his Zuniga identification, was fingerprinted and charged with driving while intoxicated. He never showed up for court.
On Dec. 30, 2003, police in Fayetteville, Ark., stopped him, again on suspicion of drunken driving. He was fingerprinted again, and because of the previous arrest, his fingerprints were a match under the name Jose Zuniga.
Fayetteville authorities discovered two things from the identification and fingerprints - that the man they had stopped was wanted for failure to appear in court, and that he was a fugitive charged with murder in San Patricio County, Texas.
Adding to the confusion, Martinez and Zuniga resemble each other.
This was good news to authorities at the San Patricio County Sheriff's Department. It meant that all three suspects in the slaying were in custody. The other two, Jeffrey Camacho, 35, and Orlando Molina, 27, were in the San Patricio County Jail.
But Martinez insisted to Arkansas authorities that they had the wrong man.
"They told him he was just trying to change his identity because of the murder," said San Patricio County Sheriff's investigator Joe Gaitan. "He said no way, but they did not believe him. I sent them a fax photo of our guy and they claimed they were 100 percent sure it was him."
So Arkansas shipped Martinez to San Patricio County to face the murder charge. When he arrived in Sinton a week ago today, dispatch called Gaitan to come in to question him.
"He kept telling me he was from Mexico," Gaitan said. "He told me, 'Let me tell you my story.' "
Martinez told Gaitan that he gave the name Zuniga during the first arrest instinctively because that was the name he had been using. The second time, he gave his real name, he told Gaitan, because he didn't want the previous arrest discovered. When he found out about the murder charge, he swore to Arkansas authorities that he wasn't a murderer, Gaitan said.
Martinez's story rang true with Gaitan. So he brought Molina out of the jail to see Martinez.
"I told him we had gotten Zuniga and he wanted to say hi," Gaitan said. "When he walked into the office he said, 'That is not Joe Zuniga.' "
Gaitan contacted authorities in neighboring Nueces County, where Zuniga had been arrested.
"I talked to the I.D. person," Gaitan said. "I faxed her a copy of the fingerprints and 15 minutes later she called back and said he was not our Jose Zuniga."
Immigration authorities picked Martinez up earlier this week and took him back to Mexico.
Zuniga still is missing and Gaitan said San Patricio County authorities have no idea where he might be. Anyone with information on Zuniga can call Gaitan at 361-364-2251
Contact Jaime Powell at 886-3716 or powellj@caller.com
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