SALT LAKE CITY — Two more people were arrested Monday in connection with a 2017 killing in the parking lot of the Kearns Recreation Center during an attempted drug robbery.
Anthony Gene Knight, 19, of Salt Lake City, and Angel Fernandez, 19, of South Salt Lake, were arrested Monday for investigation of murder and robbery.
Their arrests come three days after Unified police announced that Carson Michael Lee O’Dell, 19, had also been arrested for the Oct. 23, 2017, shooting death of 20-year-old Joshua Belen.
O’Dell, Knight, Fernandez and others arranged to buy a small amount of marijuana from Belen outside the Kearns Recreational Center, 5624 S. Cougar Lane. Police say the plan was to rob Belen once O’Dell and others met up with him.
But during the confrontation, Belen pulled out a gun, prompting O’Dell to pull out his own gun and shoot Belen once in the head, according to police.
“Angel explained that when they confronted Belen, Belen pulled out a firearm. Carson and Angel pulled out their own firearms. Carson told Belen to drop the pistol. Belen did not drop his pistol. Carson shot Belen and the group fled,” according to a Salt Lake County Jail booking affidavit.
Knight told police that “he provided a pistol to one of the associates who planned on robbing Belen directly. Anthony stayed with the vehicle while Carson and several others met with Belen. The robbery went poorly and Carson shot Belen,” Unified police wrote in a second Salt Lake County Jail booking affidavit.
O’Dell was also charged last week in 3rd District Court in connection with two other violent robberies on Aug. 23 and Nov. 25, according to court documents.
According to court records, both Knight and Fernandez are also witnesses in another murder investigation that took place six months before Belen was killed.
On April 3, 2017, police were called to the Callaway Apartments, 1095 W. Clubhouse Drive (3990 South), where they found Maria Alegandra Ayala, 19, shot to death in the driver’s seat of a car, according to court documents.
Domingo Rodrigues, 20, who uses the moniker “Demon,” was charged in 3rd District Court with murder, a first-degree felony, and six counts of discharge of a firearm, a third-degree felony.
According to charging documents, two groups were leaving a party in separate cars when the occupants of Ayala’s car waved gang signs. Rodrigues responded by shooting at them from the car he was in, the charges state.
Court documents filed this year state Knight was in the same car as Rodrigues at the time of the shooting, and Fernandez also witnessed the shooting. Rodrigues’ next court hearing was scheduled for Jan. 24.
In February, Fernandez was charged with theft by receiving stolen property, a second-degree felony, for his role in stealing four cases of beer from a gas station, according to charging documents.