2nd suspect in Phoenix murder remains unidentified in 2014 case
Feb 6, 2023, 1:00 PM | Updated: 1:07 pm
(Pixabay Photo)
(Pixabay Photo)
This article originally appeared March 16, 2015.
Phoenix Police Sgt. Derek Elmore said officers responded to a welfare-check call at the home of Jesus Cortez near 67th Avenue and Indian School Road a week before Christmas, Dec. 17, 2014.
“Our 38-year-old victim was dead when officers arrived,” he said. “They could see there was some kind of forced entry.”
Jesus Cortez, a father of four, had been murdered. He’d started Cortez Construction in 2010 with his two sons.
His daughters said he was very much a family man who spent every Sunday with them playing dominoes and eating his favorite foods.
Jesus Cortez
The night of the killing, his truck, his SUV and a box trailer all went missing.
The vehicles were recovered but the trailer is still gone. One person was arrested two days after the crime.
“They took two vehicles so we know there was at least a second suspect,” Elmore said. “The arrested person is not helping detectives with that information.”
Read more about this case here.
Our next case involves a 6-foot-3 suspect posing as a cop and making traffic stops.
“The suspect, who later identified himself as Hector to our victim, was wearing a bulletproof vest with the word ‘Sheriff’ in big yellow letters across it,” Elmore said.
He even has his car modified. It’s a white sedan with dark tinted windows and blue and red flashing lights on the dash.
On the night of Feb. 9, 2015, he pulled behind a woman driving near 48th and Van Buren streets.
She wisely pulled into a well-lit, occupied convenience store. The poser told her she could get out of going to jail if she performed certain sexual favors.
Elmore said she was able to placate the man by asking for his number and telling him she’d meet him later. She was able to get away.
Read more about this case here.
