An ex-con who fatally shot his girlfriend during a fit of rage over her using methamphetamine without him in Perris was sentenced Friday to 62 years to life in state prison.
Martin Jason Estrada, 43, of Desert Hot Springs was convicted in May of first-degree murder and being a convicted felon in possession of a firearm, with sentence-enhancing gun and great bodily injury allegations, for the slaying of 45-year-old Rachel Davis of Banning in 2015.
Riverside County Superior Court Judge Jorge Hernandez imposed the sentence required by law.
According to the District Attorney's Office, Estrada and the victim met in 2014 while going through a drug rehab facility, and the two soon began referring to each other as "husband and wife."
Estrada and Davis both battled addictions to meth, and shortly after leaving rehab, she began dealing the drug, using the defendant for "muscle" to collect on unpaid debts from buyers, according to a trial brief filed by Deputy District Attorney Sam Shouka.
On the night of Oct. 27, 2015, Davis and Estrada went to a mobile home located in a remote area of Perris known as Enchanted Heights, occupied by a woman identified in court documents as "April," who was visiting with two other friends, identified as "Chelsea" and "Michael."
The purpose of going to the property was for Davis and Chelsea to discuss an alleged check fraud scheme the two women had concocted, Shouka said.
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During the visit, Chelsea, April, Michael and Davis went into the bathroom to smoke meth, the prosecutor said, adding that Estrada was either not invited to join them or elected not to, initially remaining in the living room, then walking outside to the victim's black Chevrolet Cobalt.
The brief stated that the defendant became irate while waiting outside, calling and texting Davis on her cell phone, yelling into the phone at one point -- loud enough for the three witnesses to hear — "Get your (expletive) ass out here before I kill you!"
Davis tried to laugh off the behavior but after five minutes, she left the bathroom and went outside, according to the prosecution.
After the victim joined Estrada in the car, he launched into a tirade against her, eventually pulling a compact .45 semiautomatic pistol from his waistband and shooting her in the head as she sat in the passenger seat of the Cobalt, Shouka said.
The witnesses heard the commotion and went to see what had transpired, at which point Michael spotted the victim's lifeless body, just as Estrada sped away from the residence, screaming that someone had come out of the bushes and shot Davis, according to court papers.
No one called 911.
Davis' partially decomposed remains were found in her car, parked along Metz Road, on Nov. 6, 2015.
Sheriff's investigators spent the next four months piecing together what happened, analyzing forensic evidence and trying to find witnesses, all of whom were reluctant to talk — and whose stories changed over time, according to the prosecution.
In February 2016, detectives procured sufficient evidence to arrest Estrada, who had given the murder weapon to his brother, with whom he was staying in Sky Valley at the time he was taken into custody.
