In the spring of 2020, a shooting in a Denver neighborhood cut short the life of 15-year-old Fabian Medina. On the evening of April 11th, violence erupted in the 1600 block of South Tennyson Street. When the gunfire ceased, Fabian Medina, a male, was found deceased in the street amidst spent bullet casings. Another man, 36-year-old Jose Contreras, was also fatally shot during the incident.
A third male victim was injured but survived.
The investigation into the double homicide led Denver police to identify a person of interest. Guadalupe Villanueva, who was injured in the shootout, was arrested the day of the incident on suspicion of first-degree murder. However, he was released two days later, and no formal charges were filed against him in connection with the deaths of Medina and Contreras. The case has remained without a definitive resolution, leaving the families of the victims without closure.
In a later, unrelated incident in December 2020, Villanueva was identified as the suspect in a shooting that critically injured a 3-year-old girl in a dispute over a handicap parking space. He was subsequently arrested in January 2021 at the U.S.-Mexico border on charges of attempted murder for that event. Despite his arrest for the separate crime, to date, no one has been held responsible for the deaths of Fabian Medina and Jose Contreras. The investigation into their murders is officially still open.
