Armando Zamora: Man pleads guilty to killing wife with axe while on probation after ankle monitor exposes crime

SILVER CITY, NEW MEXICO: A New Mexico man, 38-year-old Armando Zamora pleaded guilty to killing his wife with an axe while he was on probation for criminal sexual contact with a minor, and was wearing a GPS ankle monitor.

Zamora, pleaded guilty to second-degree murder, tampering with evidence and admission of identity, habitual offender in the death of his 39-year-old wife, Erica Zamora, according to his plea and disposition agreement obtained by Law and Crime.

What did Armando Zamora do? 

Zamora received sentences of four years for each of the two charges of tampering with evidence and 16 years for second-degree murder. The terms will be carried out one after the other.

As  Law and Crime previously reported, he pleaded guilty in 2019 to criminal sexual contact with a minor under the age of 13 and had a pending divorce with his wife.

He had been out on supervised probation and was wearing an ankle monitor at the time he killed his wife following an argument.

When was Erica Zamora last seen?

Erica Zamora was last seen on September 26, 2021. State police said that the woman was officially reported missing on October 1, days after she was killed in the Gila National Forest.

Armando Zamora was quickly identified by investigators as a suspect, and the ankle monitor played a significant role in that.

The suspect's ankle monitor data, according to the New Mexico State Police , contradicts Zamora's account of where he and Erica Zamora were on September 26 and September 28.

According to the suspect's claims, on September 26, he and Erica cut wood in a forest before heading back home. Then, he claimed to have dropped Erica off at her house early on Tuesday, September 28, 2021.

According to authorities, Zamora admitted to the axe murder. This was after Zamora was cornered about ankle monitor data evidence, as per which he did not drop the victim off at her house on September 28 as he claimed.

GPS data also placed Zamora at the scene where the victim’s body was found.

"Agents interviewed Armando on October 3, 2021. During the interview, Armando admitted to beating Erica to death with an axe,” police said.

Zamora allegedly claimed that the victim punched him before he beat her to death with the axe. The murder weapon was reportedly found in the suspect’s home.