In the late hours of a February evening in Mesa, Arizona, a dispute that began inside a restaurant tragically spilled out into the parking lot, forever altering the lives of two families. The night of February 13, 2022, ended in the violent death of 27-year-old Alejandro Saldano Hernandez, a Hispanic male. What started as a disagreement between two groups of people escalated into a physical altercation, a precursor to the deadly events that would soon unfold under the cool Arizona sky.
The argument, which had simmered within the restaurant walls, reached its boiling point in the open air of the parking lot near University Drive and Center Street. A fistfight broke out between Hernandez and a group that included 35-year-old Jose Ivan Chavez Garcia. The fisticuffs took a dark turn when Garcia reportedly retrieved a handgun from his 2011 Chevrolet Silverado. In a moment of irreversible violence, Garcia is said to have shot Hernandez multiple times. First responders found Hernandez lying in the parking lot and rushed him to a nearby hospital, but his injuries proved to be fatal, and he was pronounced dead.
In the immediate aftermath of the shooting, Jose Ivan Chavez Garcia fled the scene in his vehicle. His truck was later discovered abandoned near Gilbert and Broadway roads, but Garcia himself remained at large. For weeks, investigators pieced together the events of that fatal night, gathering evidence and speaking with witnesses. Their efforts culminated on March 1, 2022, when detectives executed a search warrant at Garcia's Mesa home and took him into custody. During questioning, Garcia allegedly admitted to his involvement in the shooting, stating that it was the result of the argument between his friends and Hernandez. He was subsequently arrested and booked into jail on a charge of first-degree murder, bringing a somber sense of closure to the initial phase of the investigation into the death of Alejandro Saldano Hernandez.
