Prosecutors have decided against retrying an Arizona rancher accused of fatally shooting a Mexican national who crossed onto his property near the southern border after his murder trial ended with a hung jury last week.
The Santa Cruz County Attorney’s Office decided to drop the highly politicized case against 75-year-old George Alan Kelly after jurors were unable to come to a consensus on a verdict following more than 48 hours of deliberation.
Santa Cruz County Superior Court Judge Thomas Fink declared a mistrial last Monday, which left the decision of whether to retry Kelly for the death of Gabriel Cuen-Buitimea, 48, up to the prosecutors.
“Because of the unique circumstances and challenges surrounding this case, the Santa Cruz County Attorney’s Office has decided not to seek a retrial,” Deputy County Attorney Kimberly Hunley told Fink Monday.
The judge agreed to dismiss the case and will set a hearing date to see if the dismissal will be without prejudice — which would make it so that the charges wouldn’t be able to be brought back to court.
Kelly’s lawyer Brenna Larkin plans to file a request for the case to be dismissed without prejudice.
In the meantime, the rancher said he felt “relief” when interviewed by a local reporter from KGUN as he left the courthouse.
“The nightmare’s over,” Kelly said.
He offered his “sincere sympathy” to Cuen-Buitimea’s family outside the courthouse where protesters had gathered to demand a retrial so that the victim could get justice.
“Gabriel was a human being,” one of the protesters had written across a sign.
Kelly, whose trial lasted nearly a month, had been charged with second-degree murder for the Jan. 30, 2023 shooting outside Nogales, Arizona.
His victim, Cuen-Buitimea, lived just south of the US-Mexican border in Nogales, Mexico. He was crossing Kelly’s Arizona cattle ranch with a group of other men when the elderly rancher fired nine shots from an AK-47 rifle toward them from about 100 yards away, according to prosecutors.
Kelly claimed the shots were only meant to be a warning and that he didn’t aim directly at anyone, but one of the bullets struck Cuen-Buitimea, killing him.
The case ignited debate across the country with the influx of migrants from the south coming into the US as Republicans have slammed President Biden for his handling of the border crisis as he is up for reelection.
GoFundMe campaigns created to support Kelly — who was initially held on $1 million bond — were forcibly shut down for violating the site’s policies on raising funds to benefit people accused of violent crimes.
With Post wires
