ONLY ON ABC-7: Las Cruces MMA fighter’s journey since deadly home invasion

It’s been a year since the deadly home invasion that made national headlines. The homeowner, who is also an MMA fighter, is still mentally recovering from the ordeal.

Police say four men broke into Joe Torrez’s Dona Ana home on New Year’s Day of 2014, over a previous altercation. Police say the men got into a fight that somehow ended up outside the home. Police say three of the men, Leonard Calvillo, Raymond Garces and Nathan Avalos fled the scene. The fourth man, Sal Garces, was found stabbed to death.

“I just did what any father would do. Protecting his family and kids and that’s all I can say,” Joe Torrez said.

Though Torrez wasn’t immediately charged, he wasn’t a free man just yet. He would wait nearly eight months for the Dona Ana County Sheriff’s office to conclude their investigation, and for the District Attorney’s office to make a formal decision in the case.

Would he be charged in the death of Sal Garces?

“I thought my life was over, I thought I was going to go to prison. I was scared, I thought I wasn’t going to see my kids grow up,” Torrez said.

Meanwhile, his fighting career was put on hold.

“I was battling demons I didn’t think I was ever going to fight again,” Torrez said.

In June, Sal Garces’ autopsy report was released. It showed Garces died of multiple stab wounds to the head, neck, heart and left arm. Garces’ mother called Torrez a ‘murderer.’

“This is not self-defense, this is murder. I’m asking for justice for my son,” Cindy Garces said in an interview last year.

To this day, Torrez says he acted in self-defense and was only protecting his family.

“I’m not a murderer everyone has their own opinions, I’m not a murderer I was just protecting my family and if you call someone protecting their family a murderer, I guess you can call me that,” Torrez said.

In July, came the moment Torrez waited for. The D.A’s office decided not to file charges against him. Officials said the evidence gathered in the case, supported Torrez’s claims of self-defense.

Torrez could finally breathe a sigh of relief.

“I feel pretty good, for once,” Torrez said, after the decision was announced in July.

The recovery process was far from over, however, even affecting his young son who was in the home at the time of the incident.

“We’re not fully recovered, as you can see my son is still shy. He’s not really how he used to be, but we’re getting there,” Torrez said.

Torrez was scheduled to fight in Las Cruces over the weekend, it would be the first time he would fight since the incident occurred.

“I mean it’s nerve-wrecking, but this is what I was born to do. I’m excited to get back into the cage,” Torrez said.

Torrez’s opponent however, did not make weight and the fight was cancelled.

As Torrez reflects on the past year, he says this ordeal has been the toughest fight of his life. As he looks ahead at the new year, he says he’s ready to get back in the cage and move on in life.

“Yes I am. I was born for this and I’m going to show them this is what i was meant to do.”

“We take it one fight at a time.”

The three men who police say broke into Torrez’s home are expected to go to trial in March.