Peo v. Tapia

── Peo v. Tapia ── Court: Colorado Court of Appeals Date: May 14, 2026 Category: General 23CA2031 Peo v Tapia 05-14-2026 COLORADO COURT OF APPEALS Court of Appeals No. 23CA2031 City and County of Denver District Court No. 22CR1855 Honorable Adam J. Espinosa, Judge The People of the State of Colorado, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Vincent S. Tapia, Defendant-Appellant. JUDGMENT AFFIRMED Division IV Opinion by JUDGE SCHUTZ Freyre and Brown, JJ., concur NOT PUBLISHED PURSUANT TO C.A.R. 35(e) Announced May 14, 2026 Philip J. Weiser, Attorney General, Austin R. Johnston, Assistant Attorney General, Denver, Colorado, for Plaintiff-Appellee Suzan Trinh Almony, Alternate Defense Counsel, Broomfield, Colorado, for Defendant-Appellant ¶1 Defendant, Vincent S. Tapia, appeals the trial court’s judgment of conviction entered on a jury verdict finding him guilty of second degree murder. We affirm the judgment. I. Background and Procedural History A. Incident and Arrest ¶2 Tapia and Ricardo Santos, the victim, were friends who grew up together. On the evening of April 1, 2022, Santos and Tapia drove in Santos’s car and picked up Isabella Lara-Tello and Leanel Martinez. Tapia was in the front passenger seat and Lara-Tello and Martinez were in the back. Martinez testified that she and Tapia were Facebook acquaintances who had met up a few times in person. Lara-Tello was Martinez’s friend and had not previously met Santos or Tapia. ¶3 Martinez testified that, on the way to a nightclub, while Santos was driving, Santos and Tapia passed around a tequila1 bottle, and they all took turns drinking from it. There was also testimony 1 The state’s toxicology expert performed a retrograde extrapolation on Tapia and determined that his blood alcohol concentration (BAC) was .272 at the time of the shooting. 1  about smoking marijuana. Martinez testified that she saw Santos pass a revolver to Tapia while they were in the car. ¶4 Santos collided with another car stopped at a red light. Santos drove away from the accident scene, and Santos and Tapia argued about who was responsible for the accident (there was some suggestion that Tapia may have grabbed the steering wheel). Santos allegedly told Tapia that he had to either agree to pay part of the repair expenses or fight him. Santos pulled over, and he and Tapia got out of the car. Anticipating that Santos and Tapia were about to fight, Martinez also got out of the car and called a friend. Lara-Tello remained in the car. Santos and Tapia got into a fist fight, and, at some point, Tapia pulled out the handgun and fired it twice at Santos. One bullet struck Santos’s neck. ¶5 Tapia ran away. Lara-Tello cradled Santos’s head and applied pressure to the wound while Martinez called the police. When the officers arrived, Martinez showed the officers Tapia’s Facebook profile. Santos was taken from the scene by ambulance shortly after police were called but ultimately succumbed to his injuries at the hospital. 2 ¶6 At around 11:40 p.m., police officers located Tapia about six blocks away from the shooting and handcuffed him. Officer Vincent Lombardi read Tapia his Miranda rights and asked him if he would like to talk to the officers. See Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436, 444 (1966). A visibly intoxicated Tapia initially said that he wanted to talk to his mother but eventually talked to Lombardi. The officers later took Tapia into custody. ¶7 Just before 4 a.m., Tapia was interviewed again at the police station by Detective Mark Crider. Before Crider entered the room, Tapia was asleep at a table and still appeared to be intoxicated. Crider read Tapia his Miranda rights. Tapia indicated that he understood the advisement and signed