A man who pled guilty for his part in the kidnapping and death of an 18-year-old U.S. citizen in Tijuana was sentenced Friday to five years in prison.
Luis Armando Dorantes Rivera, who was sentenced in San Diego federal court, was one of the assailants who attacked the victim in the garage of a Tijuana hotel in May 2020.
After other co-conspirators beat and pistol whipped the victim, identified in court documents only as M.A.R., Dorantes punched him and dragged him into a car, according to court documents.
Prosecutors say the victim then was abducted, beaten more and tortured while his captors demanded a ransom from his family, to be paid with cash or drugs – up to $3,000 or methamphetamine.
A prosecution trial brief states the victim had agreed to transport just over two pounds of methamphetamine across the border for one of the defendants, but stole the package, leading to the retaliatory kidnapping.
Prosecutors say that one day after the kidnapping, Brian Alexis Patron Lopez
shot and killed
M.A.R. A San Diego federal jury
convicted Patron
in March of charges that include intentional killing while engaged in drug trafficking.
Dorantes and three other co-defendants pleaded guilty to various other charges, including conspiracy to kidnap.
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Dorantes’ defense attorney, Matthew Binninger, said in his sentencing papers that his client did not know the victim would be killed and would not have participated had he known.
He wrote that Dorantes agreed to help after being told M.A.R. had stolen money from one of his family members. Since the event, Binninger wrote that Dorantes was “ashamed” and “deeply sorry” that the victim ended up dead.
