Amber Joy Patton was a 34-year-old White/Caucasian woman and U.S. Army veteran who had served in Iraq and was living in Chandler, Arizona at the time of her death. She was born on June 24, 1986, in Saint Joseph, Michigan, spent her early years in Stanley, Wisconsin, and later moved with her family to Casa Grande before eventually settling in Chandler.
Friends and family described her as someone who loved animals, Batman, and the Green Bay Packers, and who struggled with post-traumatic stress after returning from military service but continued working and building a life for herself in Arizona.
On the night of September 19, 2020, Patton returned home from her shift at a car wash shortly before 11 p.m. in a quiet Chandler neighborhood not far from where a stolen vehicle had recently crashed. According to police and later court records, two teenagers who had been using the stolen car followed her into her garage. Inside the home, investigators later documented a chaotic scene: Patton’s backpack and fast-food dinner were dumped in the hallway, bullet casings were found in the laundry room and garage, and she had been shot and left on the bedroom floor. A roommate discovered her dead the next morning, and her car was missing, leading authorities to conclude she was the victim of a random, violent robbery and murder connected to a larger crime spree that had been unfolding across the East Valley that summer.
Detectives soon linked Patton’s killing to a two-month series of violent crimes that included another murder, multiple shootings, kidnappings, carjackings, and armed robberies in Tempe, Phoenix, Mesa, and surrounding communities. Investigators identified two suspects: James Faser Quintero of Tempe and Corbin Myles McNeil of Phoenix, both teenagers at the time. Police say they had been on a crime spree since July 2020, and evidence from the Chandler homicide — including forensic and photographic material and the trail of stolen vehicles — helped detectives from several agencies piece the cases together. Patton’s stolen car was later found crashed near Florence, and within weeks, a multi-jurisdictional task force arrested the two teens in early October.
Quintero and McNeil were charged as adults in a 25-count felony indictment that included two counts of murder, as well as aggravated assault, armed robbery, kidnapping, car theft, and firearm offenses. One of the murders was that of Matthew Meisner in Tempe in July 2020; the second was the killing of Patton in Chandler in September. In 2022, both defendants entered plea agreements admitting responsibility for the two murders and additional crimes tied to the spree. A judge sentenced each of them to 38 years in prison; because they were under 18 at the time of the offenses, they were not eligible for the death penalty. Patton’s family has spoken publicly about the senselessness of the crime and about how, in a grim way, her death helped end the spree and prevent further victims, with her mother characterizing the young men as ruthless and emphasizing that their decision to kill her left her loved ones with a lifetime of grief.
