MILLVILLE, Utah, Aug. 12, 2021 (Gephardt Daily) — Cache County Sheriff’s officials have revealed more details after a fatal shooting Thursday afternoon at a Millville construction site.
The victim was 29-year-old Arellano Nieto Yovani, from Logan. Police originally reported he was 19.
The suspected shooter, now being held without bail in the Cache County Jail, is Lorenzo Tena-Vasquez, 59. He is charged with murder, a first-degree felony.
Both men were construction workers who had a dispute earlier at their job site, says a statement issued by Cache County Sheriff D. Chad Jensen.
“On 8/12/2021 at 12:49 p.m., deputies and medical staff were summoned to the report of a shooting at a home construction site in Millville,” says the probable cause statement.
“The caller indicated that the suspect, Lorenzo Tena-Vasquez, had come to the construction site with a gun and that the victim, Y.A., had been shot. Lorenzo was taken into custody outside the home when deputies arrived with blood on his clothing, telling the arresting deputy that he had shot the victim.”
Yovani’s body was found “with injuries preliminarily consistent with gunshot wounds,” the statement says. “After the scene was secured and appropriate resources requested, Lorenzo was transported to the Sheriff’s Office for an interview, which was conducted entirely in Spanish.”
The statement says that post Miranda, Tena-Vasquez agreed to talk to responding officers.
“Lorenzo maintained that he and the victim were co-workers who had been in a confrontation that morning (also 8/12/21), in which the victim had threatened him,” the statement says. “Lorenzo informed me that after this brief confrontation he left the job site and went back to his own residence for a period of several hours.
“He indicated that he was fearful and angry about having been threatened, and obtained a handgun from his residence and returned to the job site, finding the victim in a basement room. Lorenzo informed me that he approached Y.A. and shot him six to seven times, explaining that rather than waiting for Y.A. to come to his home to harm him as Y.A. had threatened to do, he felt it best to shoot Y.A. on this occasion.”
Tena-Vasquez maintained the shooting was self-defense, “however, he described that when he contacted the victim, Y.A. was in a seated, defenseless position, unarmed at the time of the shooting.”
A witness to the shooting, identified in court paperwork as B.C., told investigators Tena-Vasquez had entered the room and approached Yovani, who was seated and using his phone.
“B.C. indicated that Lorenzo then shot Y.A., while Y.A. was screaming ‘No!’ B.C. recounts running from the room and hearing additional shots as he left. B.C.’s account contradicts Lorenzo’s claims that he was in imminent danger at the time of the shooting.”
Investigators concluded Tena-Vasquez “intentionally caused the death of YA and accordingly has been booked into the Cache County Jail for 1st degree felony murder,” the statement says.
Gephardt Daily will have more information as the investigation continues.
