Rancher, 73, who has bail set at $1m for pleads with judge to be let out to take care of his wife
SANTA CRUZ COUNTY, ARIZONA: The bail for an Arizona rancher has been set at $1 million after he was charged with the murder of a Mexican citizen on his property. George Alan Kelly, 73, fatally shot Gabriel Cuen-Butimea, 48, on his ranch in Kino Springs, just a mile and a half north of the US-Mexico border on January 30, 2023. The investigation is currently ongoing but the Santa Cruz County Sheriff's chief deputy said that the suspect apparently had no prior connection to the victim.
According to the federal court records, Cuen-Butimea, who had a history of illegally crossing the US-Mexico border, was deported back to the country several times, the last one being in 2016. Nogales International reports that US Border Patrol agents informed the county sheriff's department of a 'possible active shooter' at the scene with a man identifying himself as Alan, claiming he was unsure if he was getting shot.
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How did the authorities identify Cuen-Butimea's body?
Santa Cruz County Sheriff's officials said they found Cuen-Butimea's body on January 30, just about 100 to 150 yards from Kelly's home. The victim was shot once and was identified as a resident of Mexico because of a Mexican voter registration card he carried. The officials are still trying to find out the possible motive behind the murder, with Chief Deputy Gerardo Castillo stating, "It doesn't seem like Mr Kelly and the [victim] knew each other."
However, under Arizona's law, it is legal to shoot someone if the homeowner believes it is "immediately necessary" to prevent trespassing. The sheriff's deputies received another report of shots fired at the property at around 5.50 pm and they recovered Cuen-Butimea's body by 6.42 pm. There was no weapon on the victim at the time, authorities said.
The investigators seized a couple of assault-style rifles from Kelly's property in the aftermath to determine whether either was used in the shooting.
Kelly asked the judge to reduce the bail amount citing his wife at his last court hearing. "She's there by herself... nobody to take care of her, the livestock, or the ranch," he said, according to Nogales International. "And I'm not going anywhere. I can't come up with a million dollars," he said, before asking the judge to "consider reducing it to any degree."
Who is George Alan Kelly?
George Alan Kelly, who identifies himself as a rancher, is also an amateur writer of a self-published fiction about ranch life in the border region. One of his books, available as an ebook on Amazon, is titled 'Far Beyond the Border Fence' and is described as "bringing the Mexican border/ drug conflict into the 21st century." The lead characters of the story are a couple whose first names match Kelly and his wife Wanda's names and even include his son's name.
Kelly is currently being held at the Santa Cruz County Jail and is set to return to court on Wednesday, February 8, 2023.