{"id":1387301,"date":"2019-02-10T22:04:00","date_gmt":"2019-02-11T05:04:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.postindependent.com\/news\/olivo-tellez-murder-trial-begins-in-glenwood-springs\/"},"modified":"2019-02-10T22:04:00","modified_gmt":"2019-02-11T05:04:00","slug":"olivo-tellez-murder-trial-begins-in-glenwood-springs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kkch\/local-news\/olivo-tellez-murder-trial-begins-in-glenwood-springs\/","title":{"rendered":"Olivo-Tellez murder trial begins in Glenwood Springs"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Opening arguments in the murder trial against Gustavo Olivo-Tellez are scheduled to begin Monday morning after a weeklong jury selection process.<\/p>\n

Prosecuting and defense attorneys settled on a 16-member jury Friday, which includes 12 primary and four alternate jurors. All 16 were sworn in Friday afternoon.<\/p>\n

The case against Olivo-Tellez charges him with killing his estranged wife, Blanca Salas-Jurado, in October 2016. It has had a long road to trial, after Olivo-Tellez first pleaded not guilty in June 2017. <\/p>\n

Ninth District Attorney Jeff Cheney maintains that Olivo-Tellez’ alleged accomplice and then-girlfriend, Michelle Castillo, assisted in the murder. <\/p>\n

Castillo pleaded guilty to accessory murder in the death of Salas-Jurado in December 2017, and Olivo-Tellez then pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity<\/a> in April 2018. <\/p>\n

The insanity plea requires a mental health evaluation, which was conducted last May by the Colorado Department of Behavioral Health, after which Olivo-Tellez re-entered a not-guilty plea and the case was set for trial<\/a>.<\/p>\n

During a motions hearing in December, prosecutors and defense attorneys, led by Garth McCarty, agreed that what Olivo-Tellez said in the video-taped mental health evaluation will not be admissible during the trial, unless the defense attorneys bring it into evidence. <\/p>\n

Prosecutors have transported Castillo to the Garfield County Jail from a Colorado corrections facility on the Front Range to be a witness for the trial. She is serving a 16-year sentence.<\/p>\n

In an order on defense motions, Ninth District Judge John Neiley ruled that prosecutors are allowed to make a case for Olivo-Tellez’ alleged motives based on circumstantial evidence, like when the firearm used to shoot Salas-Jurado was acquired and how. <\/p>\n

Defense attorney’s made the case that simply purchasing a weapon was insufficient to determine motive and was therefore prejudicial under the Constitutional right to bear arms. <\/p>\n

Prosecutors claim that after the shooting at Salas-Jurado’s apartment, Olivo-Tellez ditched the gun and ammunition in the Roaring Fork River and fled with Castillo, who also may have assisted in acquiring ammunition used in the shooting. <\/p>\n

According to arresting documents, Castillo dropped off Olivo-Tellez’ son with family in Grand Junction, then rendezvoused with Olivo-Tellez before getting arrested at a Grand Junction hotel a day after the alleged murder.<\/p>\n

At the December motions hearing, prosecutors agreed not to present evidence that the child was in the room, or in the apartment, at the time of the alleged shooting.<\/p>\n

tphippen@postindependent.com<\/a><\/p>\n

via:: Post Independent<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Opening arguments in the murder trial against Gustavo Olivo-Tellez are scheduled to begin Monday morning after a weeklong jury selection process. Prosecuting and defense attorneys settled on a 16-member jury Friday, which includes 12 primary and four alternate jurors. All 16 were sworn in Friday afternoon. The case against Olivo-Tellez charges him with killing his […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[112],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1387301","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-local-news"],"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-10-05 07:46:09","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KKCH - The Lift FM","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kkch","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kkch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1387301","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kkch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kkch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kkch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kkch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1387301"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kkch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1387301\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kkch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1387301"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kkch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1387301"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kkch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1387301"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}