|
Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...
|
A New Bedford man who has been charged in the past with domestic violence and violating an abuse-prevention order pleaded not guilty Thursday to shooting and killing a woman in the South End on Tuesday.
Wilo Morales-Colon, 49, appeared in Third District Court on murder and handgun charges in the death of Karina Martinez-Ortiz, 32, who was found dead outside her first-floor apartment at 438 Bolton St. at about 6:20 p.m. Tuesday. Prosecutors said she had suffered gunshot wounds and was pronounced dead at St. Luke’s Hospital.
Morales-Colon, who did not speak during the brief proceeding on Thursday afternoon, was arrested late Wednesday night or very early Thursday morning in a house in Springfield, Assistant District Attorney Russell Eonas told Judge Teresa Lamarre.
A Spanish interpreter translated during the arraignment for Morales-Colon, who stood silently in a white jacket, his hands cuffed in front of him. A plea of not guilty was entered on his behalf.
At Eonas’ request, Lamarre ordered the suspect held without bail pending a probable cause hearing scheduled for March 28. The suspect is represented by court-appointed lawyer Dana Sargent.
Morales-Colon, who also lived at 438 Bolton St., is charged with murder in the first degree and carrying a firearm without a license.
Eonas told the judge that Morales-Colon admitted to the killing when he was arrested and showed State Police investigators where to find the gun in his car.
After the arraignment, Eonas could not say what sort of firearm was used in the shooting.
Investigators had identified Morales-Colon on surveillance videos taken outside the building on Bolton Street, Eonas told the court.
According to an affidavit filed by a State Police trooper with the court to support an arrest warrant, a loud sound is heard on the video, “followed by an individual, wearing all black, running down the building’s driveway at approximately” 5:30 pm. “The individual is then observed running through the rear of the parking lot of an adjacent business,” toward Rivet Street.
The trooper’s statement says Martinez-Ortiz was found lying on the floor outside her apartment. A witness said there were two broken plates of food scattered around her body. She had suffered “an apparent gunshot wound to her face, arm and back.”
According to the trooper’s statement, Martinez-Ortiz was bringing supper to a neighbor to whom she had been introduced by a relative of his. The neighbor, who had moved into the building just four days before, was waiting for her to return to his apartment with the food. She never did, the affidavit says.
Eonas told the judge that investigators learned that Morales-Colon and Martinez-Ortiz had a relationship that was “at times contentious … the victim at times was fearful of the defendant.”
According to the trooper’s affidavit, New Bedford police were called on Feb. 21 for a “verbal domestic dispute” between the two. The trooper’s affidavit says New Bedford police found that the two had been “in a dating relationship for a couple months.”
Martinez-Ortiz told a New Bedford police officer during that call for service that Morales-Colon “was extremely jealous and had taken her cell phone, which was the cause of the verbal argument,” the trooper’s affidavit says.
There is no record of an arrest or charges brought in the Feb. 21 incident, and it is not clear where the episode occurred. The incident does not appear in New Bedford police logs for that date.
Court records show charges brought against Morales-Colon in two cases involving his relationships with two different women years ago. The cases from 2019 and 2016 were both dismissed, records show.
In July 2019, he was charged with assault and battery on a family or household member. The police report says that a woman describing him as her husband of six months claimed that he “pushed her into a wall and slapped her across the face” during an argument.
The incident took place at his brother’s house in the South End during an argument in which he accused his wife of seeing another man in Springfield, the police report says.
In 2016, he was charged with violating an abuse-prevention order that barred Morales-Colon from having any contact with a woman, who was 41 years old at the time. The woman said Morales-Colon had violated the order by sending her a Facebook message: “God bless you and your family.”
The investigation was led by Bristol County District Attorney Thomas M. Quinn III and conducted by the Massachusetts State Police and DA’s homicide prosecutors, assisted by the New Bedford Police Department and the Diplomatic Security Service, Quinn said in a news release.
Email reporter Arthur Hirsch at ahirsch@newbedfordlight.org
