Page 18 - Linking Sam News Today

Police had their suspicions about sam lopezs involvement in the murder of his neighbor and former girlfriend, cathy torrez. but there was no physical evidence tying him to the murder. and he had a solid alibi on the night cathy was killed. sam was with his cousin, javier. which is why when police took their case to the d.a.s office, the d.a. refused to file charges against sam. police pursued other leads too, like a possible connection to the suicide of cathys boyfriend, albert. did you think th...

>> i thought she was going to page me on friday. she goes somewhere, and she never paged me on friday. >> we know that cathys mom paged him 20 or 25 times in a matter of at least a couple of days, trying to get him to contact her because hes so close to cathy and shes missing. >> reporter: montgomery noted a key detail about those pages. marys home phone and cathys home phone are the same number. >> theyre the same numbers. >> reporter: so, seeing that number on his pager, how did sam know it wa...

He wasnt alone the night he stabbed cathy to death. sams cousin javier was also arrested and charged with murder. police also arrested sams older brother, armando, who was once married to cathys sister tina, and had helped search for cathy. >> its just a tragic loss. it hurts. everybody loved cathy. >> reporter: armando was charged with being an accessory after the fact for allegedly helping cover up the murder. >> we believe that he was telling people who had information that could help convict...

Ultimately, cathy decided, says tina, that she was so broken up about albert she was going to tell sam the answer was no. >> shes crying, and then she said, "im going to tell him this saturday that im not gonna take off with him, that i will not elope." that was wednesday. and then saturday she never came home. >> reporter: sams admitted jealousy, cathys doting on albert, a rejected proposal. all of it seemed to add up to motive. but motives dont prove murder. there was still no physical evidenc...

Sleeping in the same -- essentially the same room. >> reporter: eventually, daron wyatt felt he had enough new information to get a search warrant. >> there was a loud pounding on our door. >> reporter: tina montelongo remembers it clearly. >> when i opened the door, there was about five police officers there. the one in the middle was wyatt. he put us against the wall and patted us down. >> reporter: what was sams demeanor while all that was happening? >> he was calm, you know. he really was. i...

Javier was there all the time, sleeping in the same -- essentially the same room. >> reporter: eventually, daron wyatt felt he had enough new information to get a search warrant. >> there was a loud pounding on our door. >> reporter: tina montelongo remembers it clearly. >> when i opened the door, there was about five police officers there. the one in the middle was wyatt. he put us against the wall and patted us down. >> reporter: what was sams demeanor while all that was happening? >> he was c...

>> there was a loud pounding on our door. >> reporter: tina montelongo remembers it clearly. >> when i opened the door, there was about five police officers there. the one in the middle was wyatt. he put us against the wall and patted us down. >> reporter: what was sams demeanor while all that was happening? >> he was calm, you know. he really was. i was freaking out. >> reporter: he wasnt worried? >> no. no. >> reporter: maybe he had no reason to be. police didnt find anything in the house link...

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Latest updates on this topic.