TACOMA, Washington — Pierce County prosecutors are asking that a 14-year-old boy be treated as an adult in a murder case in which a 15-year-old boy was killed and stuffed in a recycling bin.
Cristobal Arroyo, 14, and his brother, 16-year-old Luis Arroyo, have been charged with first-degree murder in the case. Luis has also been charged with first-degree robbery.
Police said 15-year-old Hector Hernandez-Valez was stabbed more than 34 times and his body dumped in the bin after Luis invited him to the boys’ home.
“This is a brutal, adult-sized crime that calls for adult-sized accountability,” Prosecutor Mark Lindquist said. “Justice and common sense calls for the defendants to be tried together as adults.”
Per Washington state law, Luis was charged automatically as an adult because he was 16 at the time of the crime.
Cristobal will be charged as a juvenile unless the court finds he should be tried as an adult. A hearing is set for September 12 to make that determination. The court will consider several criteria at the hearing including the seriousness of the offense, whether the crime was committed in an aggressive or violent manner and whether the community would be in danger if he were charged in juvenile court.
He would face a maximum sentence of about six years if convicted as charged as a juvenile, whereas he could serve anywhere between 22 to 28 years in prison if convicted as an adult.
Warning: The details that follow, which are included in a news release from Pierce County Prosecutors, are graphic and may be disturbing to some readers.
Police said Luis Arroyo was found with cash and marijuana, believed to have belonged to the victim, when he was arrested. The boys were in the process of cleaning up the crime scene when their mother walked in. She left to tell the police, and when officers arrived, they found Hernandez-Valez's body wrapped in a blanket and stuff in a recycling bin in an alley behind the home.
Police also found two notes at the home. The first note, which investigators said contained Cristobal’s handwriting, included a series of check boxes labeled “lay out bags, shut her up, hammer her bones, cutting off limbs, cutting off head, cutting open” and “done.”
A 7-year-old girl related to Cristobal and Luis was at the home when Hernandez-Valez was killed and told police she heard pounding on the stairs, saw a knife and saw blood on the carpet and on Luis’ sleeve, prosecutors said. Cristobal and Luis told the girl the knife and blood were “fake” and sat her in front of a TV to watch cartoons, prosecutors said.
The second note, which investigators said was consistent with Luis’ handwriting, included phrases such as “cut open, shank the stomach, wack (sic) the head, camera set up,” prosecutors said.
Detectives recovered cell phone video from the home that showed the victim lying face down in a bath tub. Prosecutors said Cristobal’s and Luis’ voices could be heard in the video as they swore at and taunted the victim’s body. The brothers told police Hernandez-Valez was alive and making noises when they put him in the tub. Police said they later ran water over the victim and cut his throat.
An autopsy revealed the victim was stabbed or cut more than 34 times in the head, neck, back, hands and chest. There were also about 60 small puncture wounds on the victim’s back, and his skull was fractured, which medical examiners said was consistent with having been struck by a baseball bat or a hammer. Some of the wounds were inflicted after Hernandez-Valez had died.