In the hours before he allegedly shot and killed William Dwayne Andrews on a Boulder street, Joseph Carlos Abeyta went to the Longmont home of his former girlfriend and threatened to kill her, then went to a second Longmont home, where he threatened to kill a woman, her daughter and Andrews, according to court documents.
After killing Andrews in Boulder, Abeyta allegedly returned to Longmont, where police say he confronted the son of another former girlfriend at a gas station.
The young man saw blood and a shotgun inside Abeyta’s car, punched Abeyta twice in the face and fled, according to an affidavit by Boulder Detective David Spraggs.
The three incidents in Longmont and the shooting of Andrews in Boulder all took place on the evening of Jan. 23, according to Spraggs.
The Longmont SWAT team arrested Abeyta shortly before dawn the next morning at his mother’s home in Longmont.
The affidavit was unsealed early Friday evening.
Abeyta, 41, was formally charged on Jan. 29 with Andrews’ murder by the Boulder district attorney’s office.
According to Spraggs, the woman, her daughter and Andrews were all terrified of Abeyta during the second of the Longmont incidents, which happened less than an hour before police believe Andrews, 47, was gunned down by Abeyta in Boulder.
The woman and her daughter described Abeyta as drunk and “weird and crazy” during the half hour he was in their home.
The woman and her young daughter knew Andrews but had only recently met Abeyta.
They said Abeyta and Andrews, who were both drunk, showed up at their home about 7 p.m. on Jan. 23, with Abeyta carrying a sawed-off shotgun.
As the visit progressed, Abeyta became increasingly agitated, particularly after Andrews told Abeyta to stop making passes at the child.
Abeyta picked up the shotgun and said he was going to kill Andrews, the woman and her daughter, according to Spraggs. At that point, Andrews hit Abeyta. After Abeyta was struck, Abeyta said he would just kill the woman and her daughter, according to the affidavit.
Andrews pushed Abeyta, and the woman told the men to leave or that she was going to call police.
The woman told investigators that Abeyta looked at her and told her if she called the police, he’d kill her. At that point, Andrews told Abeyta they had to leave because the cops were going to show up.
A little less than an hour later, a motorist called Boulder police after finding Andrews’ body in the 1200 block of Sumac Avenue in Boulder. Andrews had been shot twice in the chest and once in the face.
Boulder police, based on accounts of witnesses in the neighborhood, aired a description of the vehicle believed involved in the shooting.
Longmont officers, who heard the description, immediately recognized it as the vehicle that had been driven by Abeyta when he threatened to kill and robbed his ex-girlfriend in Longmont at about 6 p.m. on Jan. 23.
The former girlfriend said that Abeyta was carrying both a shotgun and a handgun, and pointed the shotgun at her face and threatened to kill her.
Based on the information from the women who were threatened by Abeyta, the Longmont SWAT team arrested Abeyta the next morning.
Howard Pankratz: 303-954-1939 or hpankratz@denverpost.com
