Charges filed on younger brother in Independence shooting
Sep. 20—A court filing states that the younger of two Honduran brothers implicated in shootings near Joplin and in Independence was drinking beer with his girlfriend when he got mad and shot a woman while trying to steal her pickup truck.
Jose B. Cantarero Benitez, 20, has been charged in Jackson County with first-degree assault, vehicle hijacking and two counts of armed criminal in the shooting late Tuesday afternoon at Hill Park in Independence. He is being held on a $500,000 bond and an Immigration and Customs Enforcement hold.
The woman, whose name has yet to be released, was taken to a Kansas City area hospital in critical condition. Independence police did not return a call Friday seeking an update on her condition.
A probable-cause affidavit filed with the charges on Cantarero Benitez states that she was discovered lying next to her truck in the park with apparent gunshot wounds to her chest and a forearm.
Cantarero Benitez and his brother, Adin A. Cantarero Benitez, 26, are believed to have been involved in a carjacking and fatal shooting of an Oklahoma man early Monday morning at a gas station on Prigmore Avenue east of Joplin.
The shooting went unreported until the body of 63-year-old Jesse Gilmore was discovered about 5:25 p.m. the same day in a ditch at mile marker 14.8 on Interstate 44. He had been shot in the head.
The older brother — charged Thursday in Jasper County with the robbery and murder of Gilmore — was arrested Monday night on a charge of driving while intoxicated in Independence. Because he was driving a pickup truck at the time and not Gilmore's missing Chevrolet Cobalt, Jasper County sheriff's investigators and police in Independence did not initially connect him with the crime.
But when his brother was nabbed shortly before midnight Tuesday in Kansas City in possession of Gilmore's stolen car, the pieces began to fall into place for investigators, leading to the charges filed on Adin Cantarero Benitez in Jasper County. A court document indicates that security video footage obtained from the gas station on Prigmore Avenue confirms certain admissions the younger brother made following his arrest.
The Jackson County affidavit states that Kansas City police were checking out reports of a prowler when they spotted Jose Cantarero Benitez standing in the shadows near the address involved, which is the home of his girlfriend. He purportedly tried to run but was caught.
A witness warned officers that he was likely to have been armed, a search was conducted along his flight path where a 9 mm handgun was recovered.
The affidavit states that the girlfriend told police that she had been in his company at the shooting in Hill Park earlier that day and knew where the car was that he had been driving. A check of its vehicle identification number revealed that it was a stolen vehicle being sought in the investigation of a killing in Jasper County.
The girlfriend further disclosed that they had been in that car drinking beer when he had walked over to a parked pickup truck, pointed the gun at its driver and ordered her out of the vehicle. When she refused, he shot her, the girlfriend told police.
She said he then tried to steal the truck but was unable to get it started, and they fled in the Cobalt.
Following his arrest, Jose Cantarero Benitez purportedly admitted to police that the 9 mm handgun they had recovered was his and that he had used it in the shooting in Independence. He further told them that he had been with his brother in Jasper County on Monday when Adin Cantarero Benitez shot Gilmore with the same gun, which had been reported stolen in July in Kansas City.
The younger brother told police that once they got back to Independence, Adin Cantarero Benitez gave the gun back to him and left in the pickup truck that the older brother was arrested driving Tuesday.
The affidavit filed in Jackson County states that Gilmore is believed to have been living out of his car at the time of his death.
