State v. Carillo, 2017 NMSC 23

Background

Early morning of Dec. 4, 2011 two victims (Kinney and Frost) were found shot in a pickup in Albuquerque; multiple shell casings and a red cell phone were recovered.
Police recovered Kinney’s phone, which listed Carrillo’s number and showed numerous late-night calls and angry texts between Kinney and Carrillo prior to the murders.
Carrillo was later arrested near a restaurant after a witness saw a man break a car window with what looked like the butt of a gun; Carrillo was found without a gun and with heroin on his person.
The State presented: (1) call detail records and a cell-tower list through Cricket custodian Abraham Cabrera, and (2) maps and timelines created by Amy Tan from those records showing which towers/sectors handled calls near Old Town around the time of the killings.
Carrillo sought to exclude technical cell‑tower interpretation testimony absent a qualified expert; the trial court allowed Cabrera and Tan to testify (Cabrera was not designated an expert). Jury convicted Carrillo of two first‑degree murders (merged), felony murder, tampering with evidence, breaking and entering, and possession of heroin; Carrillo appealed.

Issues

Issue	State's Argument	Carrillo's Argument	Held
Admissibility of cell‑phone/tower testimony	Lay custodians may describe records and tower locations without expert qualification; testimony here was lay/foundation‑based	Testimony about how towers work and how calls locate a phone is technical and required a qualified expert under Rule 11‑702	Court: Custodian could testify to business records and tower locations, but testimony explaining how towers operate required expert qualification; admitting technical portions of Cabrera’s testimony was error but harmless given properly admitted records and Tan’s maps
Preservation of objection to Tan’s testimony	—	Carrillo argued both witnesses required experts; but only objected at trial to Cabrera, not Tan	Court: Objection to Cabrera preserved; objection to Tan not preserved and not reviewed (no plain error)
Sufficiency of evidence of identity for murders	Calls/texts, tower pings near Old Town at the time of killings, eyewitness report of Carrillo with a gun hours later, Carrillo’s inconsistent statements	Carrillo argued identity not proven beyond reasonable doubt	Court: Viewing evidence in favor of verdict, a rational jury could find Carrillo committed the murders; sufficiency upheld
Tampering / breaking & entering sufficiency	Witness saw Carrillo with a gun breaking into a car; he fled and was later without the gun; intent to conceal inferable; breaking was established by witness and owner testimony	Carrillo argued lack of proof of specific intent to hide weapon or that entry was unauthorized	Court: Evidence supported tampering intent (overt acts + flight/denial) and breaking & entering (breaking of window, no permission); convictions supported
Prosecutorial misconduct / cumulative error	State: no excluded‑evidence attempts; limiting instruction cured any issues	Carrillo claimed State repeatedly tried to admit excluded statements and that errors cumulatively denied a fair trial	Held: No preserved misconduct claim; record shows no prior exclusion; limiting instruction given; only one harmless error found — cumulative‑error claim rejected

Key Cases Cited

State v. Walters, 142 N.M. 644 (2007) (timely, specific objection requirement to preserve evidentiary issues)
State v. Torres, 127 N.M. 20 (1999) (de novo review for threshold evidentiary rules; prerequisites for expert testimony)
State v. Alberico, 116 N.M. 156 (1993) (trial court discretion on expert/scientific evidence)
United States v. Yeley‑Davis, 632 F.3d 673 (10th Cir.) (explaining that technical explanations of how cell towers work are expert testimony)
United States v. Hill, 818 F.3d 289 (7th Cir.) (cell‑tower operation testimony fits expert category)
Burnside v. State, 352 P.3d 627 (Nev.) (maps showing tower sites and nontechnical description admissible as lay testimony)
State v. Silva, 144 N.M. 815 (2008) (tampering requires direct evidence of intent or overt act from which intent can be inferred)