By SOPHIA VORAVONG
svoravong@jconline.com
A former Lafayette man was sentenced today to 60 years in prison for fatally shooting his ex-girlfriend and dumping her body on a rural Tippecanoe County road.
Tereso Pacheco, 46, pleaded guilty last month in Tippecanoe Circuit Court to murder in the September 2002 death of Juanita Santa Rosa, also known as Sanjuana Santarrosa, 46.
He had faced between 45 and 65 years in prison.
Pacheco was extradited in February from Mexico - where he was arrested 17 months ago during an unrelated gunfight with Mexican police - after being on the lam for six years.
Investigators with the Tippecanoe County Sheriff's Office alleged that Pacheco shot Santa Rosa because he was jealous of her new boyfriend, Edmundo Huerta.
About three months prior to Santa Rosa's death, Pacheco reportedly aimed a shotgun at Huerta and fired a round into the air. No one was injured then.
Pacheco's court-appointed attorney, Michael Trueblood, said today that Pacheco believed he and Santa Rosa had a common law marriage.
Trueblood said a "culture component" likely contributed to the shooting because Pacheco was upset that Santa Rosa was dating someone else.
Sheriff's Lt. Steve Kohne, a blood splatter expert, testified today that Pacheco's confession upon extradition was inconsistent with physical evidence inside the Pontiac Bonneville where Santa Rosa was shot.
He said Pacheco told investigators that he shot Santa Rosa once inside the vehicle and that she had partially fallen outside. He then pulled her body outside and fired several more rounds.
Kohne, however, believed that Santa Rosa was beaten prior to the first shot because of a pool of blood that filled the vehicle's passenger seat.
Blood from the gunshot struck the windshield.
Tippecanoe County Prosecutor Pat Harrington argued that Santa Rosa was killed in an execution-style shooting and that Pacheco plotted Santa Rosa's death in the months beforehand.
Pacheco, a Mexican national, faces deportation after he serves prison time.
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