DENVER (KDVR) — A man was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole after an attempted breakup led to a deadly shooting at a Brighton hotel in 2022.
Ricardo Perales-Cordero, 33, was convicted of first-degree murder after shooting a woman who tried to end their relationship, according to the 17th Judicial District Attorney’s Office.
The 28-year-old victim met Perales-Cordero online. The DA said the pair was in a long-distance relationship, as Perales-Cordero lived in Houston. However, a few days before her murder, she tried to end the relationship.
The DA said Perales-Cordero traveled to Brighton in October 2022 and met up with the victim at a hotel along Brighton Road in Brighton.
According to employee reports, they heard an argument and then two gunshots. Shortly after, the employees said Perales-Cordero had left the hotel and taken off in his car. The DA said the employees found the victim dead in the hotel room with a large gunshot wound to the head.
Perales-Cordero was later found in Trinidad. While he admitted to shooting the victim, the DA said he told authorities that she asked him to do it “as part of a suicide pact since the two could not be together.”
Perales-Cordero was convicted after a lengthy trial. The DA announced his conviction on Tuesday.
“This defendant, rather than let the victim return to her children, murdered her in cold blood in a Brighton hotel,” said District Attorney Brian Mason in a press release. “It is heartbreaking to see another incident of domestic violence take the life of a mother, who now leaves behind her children and family.”
Despite several weeks of jury trial in Adams County District Court, the jury returned its guilty verdict in less than two hours.
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