DRAPER — A jury has convicted a man of murder following a drug deal with fake money that turned into a fatal shooting in Draper three years ago.
Alexis Federico Marquez, 24, was convicted in 3rd District Court of one count of first-degree felony murder, one count of first-degree felony aggravated robbery, and two counts of first-degree felony discharge of a firearm with serious bodily injury. Salt Lake County District Attorney Sim Gill announced the verdict on Wednesday, following a five-day trial.
In August 2022, shots were fired at 11715 S. State Street in Draper. Police arrived and located Remey Rowland, 33, who had been shot to death in the parking lot of Heritage Apartments.
Detectives learned Marquez had planned to meet Rowland to buy $1,350 of cocaine. But when he got into Rowland’s car, he only had about $1,300 of “motion picture production money,” the Salt Lake County District Attorney’s Office statement said.
During the trial, Marquez claimed Rowland tried to grab the money after he got in the car and pointed a gun at him, to which he responded and shot Rowland multiple times in the face and chest, according to Gill. The alleged gun Rowland pointed at Marquez, however, was never recovered.
Marquez fled to his apartment. A week later, after a lengthy standoff with police, he was taken into custody.
“We hope that this guilty conviction helps the family of Mr. Rowland feel like they have received some measure of justice for the death of their loved one. This verdict provides the accountability our community expects, and the victim’s family deserves,” Gill said.
Marquez pleaded guilty in December 2020 to two counts of discharge of a firearm, charges that were amended to second-degree felonies, according to court records. In that incident, Marquez shot a man in the leg in Sandy. He was given a suspended prison sentence and was placed on four years of probation. A warrant was issued for his arrest on July 6, 2022, accusing him of violating the conditions of his probation, and it was still active at the time of the shooting.
In January 2020, Marquez pleaded guilty to attempted drug possession with intent to distribute. He was also given a suspended prison sentence and placed on probation in that case.
His sentencing for the murder conviction is scheduled for Jan. 6.
The Key Takeaways for this article were generated with the assistance of large language models and reviewed by our editorial team. The article, itself, is solely human-written.
