Nov. 29 – Santa Fe and New Mexico State Police troopers used K-9s and drones to search for three suspects accused of an armed robbery at a South Side Speedway on Thanksgiving Day.
They arrested a man and a woman Thursday after the truck they were riding in crashed into another vehicle and a house, but one suspect remained at large Friday, Santa Fe police said in a news release.
Miriah King, 24, and Geronimo Vigil, 37, who were both arrested, face several charges late Thursday morning at a Speedway gas station on Rodeo Road, near the intersection with Richards Avenue.
Vigil is charged with theft, aggravated assault, reckless driving, possession of a stolen motor vehicle and resisting arrest, according to a criminal complaint filed Friday in Santa Fe County Magistrate Court. King is charged with theft and resisting arrest. They were both booked into the Santa Fe County Jail Thursday evening.
According to the news release, officers were dispatched to the Speedway around 11 a.m. Thursday in response to a panic alarm. They were told a man wearing a mask had robbed the store at gunpoint and driven away in a Dodge Ram. The police started looking for the pickup.
An officer attempted to pull over a truck on Beckner Road, but the driver did not stop, the news release said. Police chased the truck on the city’s south side as the driver drove into oncoming traffic, eventually crashing into a parked vehicle and a house on Dail Circle near Calle Po Ae Pi, the statement said.
After the truck crashed, three people got out and ran, police said. After a search with dogs and drones with assistance from state police, they found King and Vigil, the release said. Police have not yet identified another man, who is believed to have fled the area.
Police claimed that surveillance video from Speedway confirmed that Vigil was the man who robbed the store at gunpoint.
Court documents detailing the circumstances of the robbery were not publicly available online Friday. It is unclear how much cash the two are accused of stealing and whether it has been recovered.
Vigil faces prior charges of being a felon in possession of a firearm, receiving or transferring stolen motor vehicles, aggravated fleeing police and resisting arrest following a grand jury indictment in September was submitted. He was arrested on those charges in July and released following a judge’s ruling in August against prosecutors’ request to hold him until his trial.
King, whose address is in Albuquerque, faced a home invasion charge in Bernalillo County in 2021, but the charge was dismissed by prosecutors.
Police are asking anyone with information about the third suspect to call detectives at 505-428-3710.
