FORT WAYNE, IN – On Friday, Pedro Sales Lopez, 30, was sentenced to 60 years in state prison for the Christmas Eve stabbing deaths of two brothers. Last month, he pleaded guilty to two counts of voluntary manslaughter.
Shortly after 7 p.m., a front desk clerk at the Coliseum Inn, went to a room to break up what he thought was a fist fight, instead, he discovered Daniel Mendez-Lopez and his brother, Alfonso Mendez-Lopez, both suffering from several stab wounds. By the time emergency personnel arrived, Daniel was dead.
Alfonso died shortly thereafter, at a local hospital from stab wounds to the chest and neck.
A surveillance camera captured some of the bloody struggle outside of the motel room. Footage also showed Lopez rifling through the pockets of an unresponsive Daniel Mendez-Lopez.
Police released images of the attacker to the public. A worker at the local Union Mission immediately recognized him as Lopez.
He was taken into custody on Christmas Day at the Mission.
WANE reported:
Pedro Lopez said he “did not touch” either Mendez-Lopez brother and left to avoid the fight, the affidavit said. He said he returned after an hour and a half to find both brothers had killed each other, he said, according to the affidavit.
In surveillance video, Pedro Lopez was seen with a large dark stain that appeared to be blood on his shirt as he was forced out of the room by the brothers. Pedro Lopez told police it was his own blood and he was himself stabbed while trying to break up the fight; police found no injuries on him, according to the affidavit.
Shortly before the judge handed down his sentencing, through an interpreter, Lopez apologized and claimed “it was a human error.”
The illegal alien's December 25, 2019 arrest, marked the third time he has been caught in this country illegally.
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