Marmolejo Guilty: Former Neighbors, Co-Workers Of Victim React To Verdict

Word spread fast of today’s guilty verdict in the David Marmolejo murder trial.

ABC-7 broke the news to the Borderland at about 10:30 a.m. Tuesday morning. And shortly afterward ABC-7 spoke with neighbors in the East El Paso neighborhood where Gloria Marmolejo was killed. And everyone had a similar reaction.

After Gloria Marmolejo’s disappearance, the discovery of her body, the arrest of her son, the trial and the re-trial, the guilty verdict had those in her old neighborhood breathing a sigh of relief.

“We knew something really bad had happened,” said Liz Kellar, who lives right around the corner from the home where Gloria Marmalejo was murdered by her son in July of 2009. “It’s going to happen sometimes close to where you live.”

ABC-7 asked Kellar whether this will finally allow the neighborhood to return to normal.

“Yes, I do, I do,” Kellar said, “She’s at rest.”

A cross, which neighbors say is lit up every night now, marks the home where Gloria Marmolejo was murdered. And neighbors said they are relieved by the verdict.

“I’m very happy because he needs to pay for what he did to his mother,” Kellar said. “I was a little freaked out because I thought the guy was gonna get off and I didn’t want him to get off. Just seeing him so smug sitting in the courtroom, it was, it was nice to see that she got justice.”

ABC-7 also spoke with some of Gloria’s former co-workers.

“I worked with her for about a year or so,” said one woman, who worked with Gloria at Workforce Solutions Upper Rio Grande and didn’t want her identity revealed. She said many who knew her were upset with the initial mistrial.

“I couldn’t believe he just got away with it,” the woman said. “What more do you need to see that he was the person that did it?”

She said Tuesday’s verdict traveled fast at her workplace.

“One of our co-workers just came around and said, ‘he’s guilty, he’s guilty’ and the first thing I said was, ‘Gracious a Dios,’ which is ‘Thank god, thank god that justice has been served over there.’ It’s been really hard. I can’t believe someone can actually do this to their mother. What kind of person? you know?”