Tri-Cities ‘enforcer’ involved in 2018 murder back in jail after holding woman at gunpoint

Oct. 18—After a woman walked into a Kennewick trailer and saw Guadalupe Angelita Sanchez in late September, she feared she wouldn’t see her children again.

The 33-year-old convicted felon spent the next eight hours allegedly holding her victim at gunpoint, moving her to a locked free-standing garage.

Along the way, she hit the victim and took her cellphone and purse.

Now Sanchez is now behind bars in Benton County jail being held in lieu of $250,000 bail on charges of first-degree robbery and fourth-degree assault.

Sanchez pleaded innocent to both charges when she appeared by video in Benton County Superior Court.

This is not the first time Sanchez has been in trouble with the law, she has been called an “enforcer” by prosecutors after she threatened a domestic violence victim.

She also helped two men hide the body of a West Richland mother in 2018, and has a string of felony convictions including assault, harassment and bail jumping in the past six years.

It’s not clear why Sanchez targeted the woman who walked into the trailer near the corner of East Seventh Avenue and South Fir Street about 9:45 p.m. on Sept. 29.

But the victim reported seeing her inside holding a small hand handgun. She told police that she had met Sanchez before and knew she was dangerous, court documents said.

Locked in a garage

The victim was taken from the trailer to a detached garage about half a mile away at 403 East Third Avenue in Kennewick. While she was in the garage, Sanchez allegedly took her cellphone and her handbag.

She also allegedly tried to take a necklace the woman was wearing.

Sanchez allegedly had the gun for the entire eight hour stretch, and pointed it at her several times. At one point, Sanchez turned turned the light off and hit her. The attack left the woman with an abrasion on her lip and swelling near her left eye.

She was able to escape out a door about 6 a.m. and called police.

When officers searched the detached garage, they allegedly found ammunition, and a stray live bullet in the living area.

Sanchez was not found inside the garage when police searched. She was arrested in another home in Kennewick on Oct. 8.

Witness tampering

Sanchez was most recently convicted for witness tampering after she threatened a domestic violence victim to try and get her to change her story.

Ramon Jaimes-Galvez kidnapped the woman at gunpoint in July 2022. He then punched her in the face, hit both of her hands with a metal pipe and used a heated metal clothes hanger to brand her.

After Jaimes-Galvez was arrested, he called Sanchez from jail to get his victim to rescind her statement.

Sanchez allegedly showed up at a Fourth Avenue apartment in Kennewick. After making the woman strip, she told the victim she was going to record her recanting her statement against Jaimes-Galvez.

She repeatedly hit the woman’s healing hands and told her that it would hurt less than “a bullet to the head.” As she made the threats, Sanchez had a gun in her hand.

According to court documents, Sanchez finally let the other woman go after she gave a taped statement recanting her story against Jaimes-Galvez.

After pleading guilty she was sentenced to a year and eight months in prison, but she had already served that time in the Benton County jail.

A Department of Corrections spokesperson said she was placed on probation in November 2023.

Jaimes-Galvez pleaded guilty to second-degree assault in connection with the attack. He was sentenced to just under five years in prison.

Murder

Among her other convictions, Sanchez helped move Michelle Hudnall’s body to an embankment where it was rolled into the Columbia River in 2018.

Hudnall’s body was allegedly found in the river near Carbody Beach about two months after she went missing.

Sanchez, along with her boyfriend Benny Rodriguez Lozano Jr., both pleaded guilty to playing a role in the death.

Sanchez pleaded guilty to first-degree rendering criminal assistance, and was sentenced to a year and three months in prison. Lozano pleaded guilty to first-degree manslaughter and was sentenced to 12 years in prison.

A third man, Florentino Jai Castillo, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit first-degree manslaughter. He was sentenced to nine years in prison.

All three were initially charged with second-degree murder.