30-04-2025
Man shot, killed in Santa Fe park entangled in 2021 killing; police mum on investigation
Santa Fe police have mostly kept mum on the details of the deadly shooting late Friday of a homeless man in a downtown park.
The victim, 49-year-old Alvin Crespin, was accused in a different killing in the city several years ago, and he had been released from the Santa Fe County jail less than six months before he was shot several times at De Vargas Park.
The police department declined to provide an interview about the ongoing investigation into Crespin's slaying, and Capt. Jimmie Montoya of the Criminal Investigations Unit declined to answer a list of questions sent via email Tuesday, writing only that officers are "in the early stages of the investigation" and "at this time, we do not have any further information for release."
Crespin was from Santo Domingo Pueblo but was known to be homeless in Santa Fe for years before he was charged with murder in 2021, when he was found in a Cerrillos Road motel room with the body of a man police alleged he had stabbed to death days earlier. He eventually pleaded guilty to lesser charges and was most recently released from jail in December, records show.
Officers responding to a report of shots fired Friday night arrived at De Vargas Park around 11 p.m. and found him with "multiple gunshot wounds," according to a news release.
It wasn't clear where he was shot or where he was found in the park.
Crespin was "in and out of consciousness" when police arrived, and he was pronounced dead later at a local hospital, Chief Paul Joye said Saturday.
Montoya said members of the public are encouraged to contact police if they have any video that captured the incident or if they observed anything before or after it. He did not say whether investigators had found any footage or how many witnesses officers have interviewed.
Murder case hit snags
Crespin's troubles with the law began in early January 2021 when a man being treated for an anxiety attack at Presbyterian Santa Fe Medical Center told police there was a body in the bathtub of Room 237 at the GreenTree Inn.
Officers arrived at the motel for a welfare check that evening and found Crespin and another man in the room, along with the body of 50-year-old Virgil Tortalita, who was also from Santo Domingo Pueblo. Police believed his body had been in the bathtub for about four days and was in "varying stages of decomposition."
Crespin initially was charged with first-degree murder.
Prosecutors alleged he had stabbed Tortalita during a struggle on New Year's Day and then wrapped his body in bedsheets and kept it in the bathtub.
Later that year, a judge declared Crespin incompetent to stand trial, and he spent about six months at the New Mexico Behavioral Health Institute in Las Vegas, N.M. A public defender told the court Crespin wasn't able to understand his charges or "rationally or effectively" communicate with his attorney, according to reports from the time.
The case hit other snags. Prosecutors said they had difficulty maintaining contact with witnesses — who were all homeless — and they faced the "catastrophic failure" of a hard drive containing surveillance footage from the motel.
Crespin pleaded guilty in April 2023 to two counts of tampering with evidence and served the remainder of his sentence in jail.
He was released in September 2023, court records indicate, but he failed to report to his probation officer several times.
He checked into the Santa Fe Recovery Center for rehabilitation in March 2024, a report says. The following month, he was booked into jail again after probation officers said they had found him on the streets of the city's south side with an open bottle of alcohol at his feet and a knife in his pocket, violating the provisions of his probation.
The last court record pertaining to Crespin was an order for his release from jail filed Dec. 19.
