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Ana Gonzalez-Munguia, 20, and Erick Galo-Ponce, 20, beat 23-year-old Nilson Velazquez-Cardona to death before his body was found under the Stony Creek Bridge on W. Marshall Street Saturday, Dec. 17 around 7:30 a.m. — Montgomery County District Attorney Kevin R. Steele and Norristown Acting Police Chief Michael Bishop said.
Dr. Ian Hood of the Montgomery County Coroner’s Office, who found that the male died of blunt force trauma to the head and the manner of death was homicide.
The defendants were taken into custody on Friday, Jan. 6, 2023, in Harris County, Texas by U.S. Marshals.
Velazquez-Cardona, of Woodhaven, N.Y., had been reported missing by his brother the day before.
The investigation found that after victim was found dead his bank was receiving notifications of someone attempting to use his credit card, including an attempted charge for a motel room in Louisiana rented in the defendants' names, polic esaid.
The two had recently been evicted from a Cherry Street home in Norristown for non-payment of rent, and the landlady confirmed that Galo-Ponce had a girlfriend name “Ana.” Physical evidence and video evidence showed that the two defendants had been living in an area close to where the victim was found under the Stony Creek Bridge.
Later in the day of the murder, Dec. 17, 2022, video surveillance from a gas station in King of Prussia showed Galo-Ponce filling up the victim’s Nissan Altima. Phone records from Gonzalez-Mungai’s cellphone show that the phone was in the vicinity at the time of the murder, then moved to the King of Prussia gas station before traveling through Pennsylvania, Maryland, West Virginia, Tennessee, Alabama, Mississippi and into Texas, where investigators learned Galo-Ponce had lived previously and had relatives in the vicinity.
“This was excellent detective work to identify the victim and then subsequently identify the two defendants by tracking them across the country as they fled,” said Steele. “We are grateful for the assistance of the U.S. Marshal’s in arresting these fugitives.”
Galo-Ponce and Gonzalez-Munguia will be extradited to Montgomery County to face charges of Second-Degree Murder, Conspiracy, Theft by Unlawful Taking, Access Device Fraud, Conspiracy, Receiving Stolen Property and other charges. They will be arraigned upon their return to Pennsylvania.
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