Arizona rancher will not be retried for murder following hung jury in deadly shooting of illegal alien: 'Nightmare is over'

The elderly Arizona rancher whose murder trial recently resulted in a hung jury will not be retried, prosecutors said.

In January 2023, 48-year-old Gabriel Cuen-Buitimea, a Mexican national who had been deported from the U.S. multiple times after he crossed the border illegally, was found shot to death on the property of 75-year-old George Alan Kelly. Kelly owns 170 acres of land near Nogales, Arizona, which is across the border from Nogales, Mexico.

Kelly was the person who found Cuen-Buitimea's body and called police to report it. Kelly admitted to firing several warning shots into the air earlier that day after he spotted a group of men armed with AK-47s invading his property but insisted that none of the warning shots could have possibly hit anyone, Daniel Horowitz, host of “Conservative Review with Daniel Horowitz,” reported shortly after Kelly's arrest.

Kelly was ultimately charged with second-degree murder. He had previously refused a plea deal that would have convicted him of one count of negligent homicide.

At Kelly's trial earlier this month, his attorney, Brenna Larkin, noted that the bullet which killed Cuen-Buitimea was never recovered and argued that Cuen-Buitimea's unzipped backpack and broken buckle suggested that he had been the victim of robbery gone wrong, the Arizona Daily Star reported.

Cuen-Buitimea was also not an innocent "migrant ... seeking the American dream," according to Dr. Ron Martinelli, who assisted Kelly's defense pro bono. Martinelli told NewsNation that Cuen-Buitimea may have been involved with human smuggling, and for evidence, Martinelli pointed to the following photo, reportedly taken a day or two before Cuen-Buitimea's death.

The photo, which was likewise shown to jurors, shows Cuen-Buitimea wearing "camouflage clothing and tactical boots" and carrying "a sophisticated two-way radio," all signs that he may have worked as a scout for cartels or other human traffickers, Martinelli explained.

Screenshot of NewsNation YouTube video

Most jurors seem to have been persuaded by Kelly's defense. After two days of deliberations, they could not come to a unanimous decision in the case, and on April 22, Santa Cruz County Superior Court Judge Thomas Fink officially declared a mistrial. Of the five men and three women on the jury, seven had voted to acquit, leaving "one, lone holdout" voting to convict, a statement from Kelly's defense team said.

Following the mistrial, Kelly was still left uncertain whether prosecutors would retry him. At a hearing on Monday, he got his answer.

"Because of the unique circumstances and challenges surrounding this case, the Santa Cruz County Attorney’s Office has decided not to seek a retrial," Deputy County Attorney Kimberly Hunley told Judge Fink.

Yet another hearing will convene in Fink's court at a later date to determine whether Kelly's case will be dismissed with or without prejudice. If it is dismissed with prejudice, Kelly will never be retried in this case.

Outside the courthouse, Kelly told reporters the "nightmare is over" and expressed condolences to Cuen-Buitimea's loved ones.

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