Murder of pregnant Colorado woman blamed on man already jailed for prior day’s crime spree
By Logan Smith
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BRIGHTON, Denver (KCNC) — Detectives from the Brighton Police Department believe a pregnant woman found dead inside a car on Friday in the Denver metro area was killed by man arrested the day before following a police pursuit.
The department filed additional charges Saturday against James “Jaime” Benavidez, 50, as he sat in the Adams County Jail. Those new charges included first-degree murder, auto theft and unlawful termination of a pregnancy.
A Brighton PD spokesperson said Benavidez was known to the pregnant woman, 32-year-old Keeley Koff. Police responded Saturday morning to a report of an abandoned car on a residential street and found the woman inside. It was parked about a mile north of Koff’s current South 8th Avenue residence.
Brighton police said Koff appeared to have been shot.
No other details about how long she had been dead, or about she and Benavidez’s relationship, have been provided by police.
Benavidez was arrested Thursday, the day before Koff’s body was discovered. According to Brighton PD, an armed Benavidez tried to rob a man of his vehicle at the Murphy Express gas station on Bromley Lane. The two wrestled at the fuel pumps and a gunshot was fired.
As police responded, Benavidez fled on a bicycle. The vehicle owner suffered minor injuries.
Minutes later, police were notified of a vehicle stolen from a business near Highway 85 and West Bridge Street, two blocks from the gas station. The owner of the car identified Benavidez as the thief, and the clothing description provided to police matched that of the gas station offender.
With additional information from the stolen vehicle owner in hand, officers located Benavidez and the stolen Dodge Nitro and began pursuing it when he refused to pull over. After driving into Commerce City, Benavidez turned back north toward Brighton, according to police radio traffic.
Benavidez allegedly fired gunshots at pursuing police vehicles, according to BPD. He hit several of them but injured no officers.
The officers returned fire and injured Benavidez, according to Brighton police. He stopped at 105th Avenue and Brighton Road and was taken into custody, then to a hospital.
By 10 p.m. Thursday night, Benavidez was out of the hospital and behind bars.
Benavidez, already the owner of a lengthy Colorado criminal record and several prison sentences, is scheduled to appear in court Thursday on Koff’s homicide. It’s expected he will be formally charged by Adams County prosecutors with her murder at that time.
Brighton PD plans to add charges related to the attempted robbery and pursuit. Those will include the attempted murder of several police officers, the department stated.
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