The Newspaper of Record since 1878

Trial in Globe mass shooting case moved to 2022

Posted

The trial of 23-year-old Sterling Randall Hunt, defendant in a mass shooting in downtown Globe, is now set to commence in January 2022.

Hunt’s trial was originally scheduled to start this Oct. 6, but was reset in a Gila County Superior Court hearing last Friday. Both sides gave oral arguments before presiding judge Pamela Gates, from Maricopa County Superior Court, on a defense motion for a two-year continuance in order to prepare mitigation.

The state is seeking the death penalty for Hunt, of Globe. He is being tried for a Nov. 11, 2018 shooting at Jammerz Bar in which three people would die and one was critically injured.

“Based on what I’ve put in my motions there is a zero percent chance this case could be ready to go before the four-year mark,” said defense attorney Michael Ziemba. Hunt is being represented by Ziemba and Thomas Henager.

Ziemba said the defense had endeavored to give the court a realistic trial date, and that rushing to trial and having a verdict sent back would be a worse outcome than taking longer than many people would like.

“For each day that this case is continued, the victims continue to get victimized,” said Chief Deputy Gila County Attorney Bradley Soos, who is prosecuting the case. Soos said he was ready to proceed. “I share in the victims’ frustration. I’ve never seen a stronger, more overwhelming instance of guilt than we have in this case.”

Soos asked the court to try the case in a year (Oct. 2021) and to set discovery status hearings every four weeks, with the defense giving dates in which they will interview state’s witnesses.

After hearing both sides, Judge Gates said the case needed to move forward and both the victims and the defendant had the constitutional right to a speedy trial. However, she added, the defendant also had the right to due process, and the right to prepare mitigation and present it to the jury. Gates said capital cases like Hunt’s take longer because of that mitigation phase. “The worst scenario is that we do this again,” she said, adding that the delay was “indispensable to the interests of justice.”

Gates set a starting date of Jan. 11, 2022 for Hunt’s trial, which is scheduled to conclude on March 18.

In the Nov. 11, 2018 Jammerz Bar shooting, according to Globe Police Chief Dale Walters, Hunt opened fire with a handgun on three of the victims on the bar’s back patio, then left and shot at two others. Walters said Hunt had played pool with the victims that night.

Two of the victims - Daniel Albo, 22, and Cristi Licano, 44 - were pronounced dead on the scene. Two others, 22-year-olds Charlene Peak and Ashley Sanchez, were flown to trauma centers; Sanchez passed away from her injuries on Nov. 15, 2018. Walters said the fifth victim, 32-year-old Scott Mills, found cover and was not hit.