Police probe fatal shooting as justified homicide
Apr. 1—Police are investigating a recent quadruple shooting that left one man dead as a justifiable homicide after they say the four men targeted had broken into the shooter's Albuquerque home and attacked him.
Police are investigating a recent quadruple shooting that left one man dead as a justifiable homicide after they say the four men targeted had broken into the shooter's Albuquerque home and attacked him.
The March 27 shooting left Neil Green, 26, dead and injured Green's brother Vincent, 26, stepfather James Apodaca, 47, and friend Daniel Acosta, 26.
Albuquerque Police Department spokesman Gilbert Gallegos said the three injured men have been charged with aggravated burglary, aggravated battery with great bodily harm and conspiracy.
"The victim of the home invasion is not being charged with a crime at this point," he said.
According to a criminal complaint filed in Metropolitan Court:
Officers responded to the incident around 1:15 a.m., when a man called 911 to report he had shot some people who attacked him at his apartment in the 5700 block of Eastern SE, near Gibson and San Pedro.
Police found Acosta wounded in the street nearby, and Vincent and Neil Green injured outside an apartment. Neil Green had been shot multiple times and was pronounced dead at the scene. His brother and Acosta were taken to a hospital.
Apodaca showed up at the hospital soon after with a gunshot wound in his buttocks.
Officers found the shooter, his family and several small children inside the apartment. The gun he used was on the kitchen table and shell casings littered the floor.
Multiple people at the home said Neil Green had been there earlier with his girlfriend but left alone after the couple fought. They said sometime later Green and three other men forced their way inside and attacked the shooter before he opened fire.
The shooter told police when Neil Green left earlier, he had jumped off the balcony and hurt his leg. The man said he went to find Green to try to get him to a hospital. Instead, the two men got into an argument, and Green told him, "I will see you again."
Later on, the man told police, there was a knock at the door before Neil Green and three others rushed in. He said Green put him in a chokehold as the others battered him with fists and a baton.
The man told police he began to lose consciousness and "was in fear for his life and the lives of his family" when he fought to get free. He said he got his gun from the bedroom and the men began attacking him again before he opened fire.
The man's girlfriend told police that, after the shooting, he began crying, saying he was sorry, "but he had to protect himself and his family" and vomited..
At the hospital, Apodaca told police Neil Green called him and told him he had been beaten up and to pick him up. Apodaca said he picked up Vincent Green, Acosta and a woman to go "retaliate."
Apodaca told police he grabbed Mace, and Acosta grabbed a chrome bar before all four broke into the apartment and were shot.
