Second suspect in case involving teen's stabbing death faces string of charges

The second juvenile suspect arrested following an altercation at Second Street Park in Gypsum on April 24 faces a series of criminal charges, including conspiracy to commit first-degree assault and attempted assault by first degree.

The suspect's name remains sealed in court documents, per a judge's order. Among the documents released by the court are a heavily redacted arrest affidavit that provides new details about the melee and its aftermath.

The first suspect arrested, Nefi Ezequiel Armijo Hernandez, 16, was taken into custody by Eagle County Sheriff's Office deputies the night of the altercation and will be tried as an adult on a charge of first-degree murder. It is not yet known whether the second suspect, arrested on May 3, nine days after the events, will also be tried as an adult.

Jackson Davis, a freshman at Eagle Valley High School, died from injuries sustained during the altercation, which involved several teenagers and occurred just before 10 p.m.

In addition to the first-degree murder charge, Armijo Hernández faces one second-degree murder charge, two violent felony charges resulting in death, and one charge of conspiracy to commit assault with a deadly weapon .

Armijo Hernández faces life in prison if convicted of first-degree murder.

The second unnamed suspect, who is listed as a co-defendant in court documents, faces nine charges in total. They include conspiracy to commit first-degree assault and attempted first-degree assault as well as tampering with physical evidence – each a felony. There are two separate charges for a crime of violence, two violent juvenile delinquent charges and another charge for third-degree assault, a misdemeanor.

The unnamed suspect's arrest affidavit details how an Eagle County Sheriff's Office deputy arrived at the park to observe Davis being loaded into an ambulance before speaking with several teenagers who remained at the scene. According to the arrest affidavit, Deputy Peta Korotkov asked people at the scene who stabbed Davis, and several people provided her with information.

The affidavit reports that Damien Stewart, another deputy who arrived at the scene, was led to a knife in the grass by Gypsum Fire Protection District personnel. The affidavit says the knife was found 3 feet from a pool of blood in the grass. Stewart described the knife as having a 4-inch fixed blade with a black and white striped pattern and a black handle.

A heavily redacted portion of the arrest affidavit provides few details about how a phone call between two parties led to the teens meeting in the park to fight. One youth, according to the affidavit, arrived at the park with a bat and another youth tried to take the bat “so it would be a 'fair fight,'” but the youth would not give up the bat. The arrest affidavit says the juvenile hit someone with the bat after the fight started — although it's unclear if it was more than one person due to the number of lines redacted by the court.

After observing cellphone videos of the incident, Korotkov determined that a man wearing a blue and yellow plaid shirt was one of the teens holding a knife in the video.

After leaving the scene, Korotkov was parked in the Eagle Valley High School parking lot when she saw two individuals walking westbound on Highway 6 and noticed that one of them was a man wearing a blue and yellow checked shirt. After the officer approached the two men and yelled at them, causing them to turn around, she observed bloodstains on the front of the shirt of a suspect who was taken into custody.

Eagle County Sheriff James van Beek declined to say whether more arrests were forthcoming or provide information about what led to the altercation at the park.

The altercation in the park involved several teenagers and videos of the incident circulated in the aftermath. The Vail Daily acquired and reviewed video of the incident, which shows a fight beginning between two men that quickly escalated into a fight involving numerous people and weapons.

Students from three area high schools – Battle Mountain, Eagle Valley and Red Canyon – were in the park during the incident.