Three documented gang members who were accused of hitting and killing an innocent Kearns couple while fleeing the scene of a drive-by shooting in 2017 have all been convicted of murder.
A 3rd District Court jury convicted Jose Mancia, 22; Rosalio Alvarez and Argenis Ramirez Saedt, both 25, on two counts of first-degree murder and one count of discharge of a firearm, a second-degree felony, on May 4 in the deaths of Tami Lynn Woodard and Lloyd Everett Pace.
The jury also found Saedt and Mancia guilty of theft by receiving stolen property, a second-degree felony. All three are scheduled to be sentenced on July 27, according to court records.
"Lloyd Pace and Tami Woodard were innocent people passing by the scene of this shooting and got caught in the middle of gang violence that took their lives. Our hearts go out to their families and loved ones for the loss they have endured," said Salt Lake County District Attorney Sim Gill in a statement Thursday.
"We would like to thank the Metro Gang Unit and the Unified Police Violent Crimes Unit for their thorough investigation and the Kearns community for rallying to hold these defendants accountable," he added. "The Kearns community members' willingness to testify at trial, despite fear, played an important part in this trial."
Prosecutors alleged that the three men were in a Ford F-150 pickup truck that approached a known gang house on the corner of 5240 W. 5391 South when someone fired two to four shots from a window of the vehicle shortly before 7:30 p.m. on Sept. 19, 2017.
The pickup then left the scene going 44 mph in a 25 mph zone, running a stop design before hitting a dip in the road and going airborne, crashing into the back of a Toyota Yaris that Woodard, 50, and Pace, 55, were sitting in. Both were pronounced dead at the scene of the crash.
The couple had been engaged for nearly a year before their deaths.
Mancia, Alvarez and Saedt were originally charged with murder 10 days after the incident. A fourth person, Jose Luis Muñoz-Lugo, was also charged with murder along the three others in 2017; however, those charges were dropped after he pleaded guilty to reduced charges in 2020, according to court records.
Records also show he was sentenced to three to 15 years at the Utah State Prison last year after his original sentence was suspended.