A gunman will serve more than nine years in prison because of a violent case of mistaken identity in Pasco.
Cesar Alejandro Mendoza, 24, pleaded guilty to attempted second-degree murder after he opened fire at two men in a car on Road 52 believing they were members of a rival gang.
Mendoza was the last person still facing charges in connection with the October 2018 shooting. All of the others also pleaded guilty to attempted second-degree murder.
With the plea, he faced between 9 1/2 years and nearly 16 years in prison, according to court documents.
Prosecutors recommended the low end of the range.
Defense attorney Peyman Younesi told the Herald that he was happy that after lengthy negotiations there was a resolution in the case.
The sentencing came nearly half a year after Mendoza's trial in Franklin County Superior Court ended in a mistrial because there were not enough potential jurors available to serve for two weeks in the middle of the summer.
Mendoza has spent a large part of his youth in and out of jail, starting with a 2015 shooting in Quincy when he was 16.
Two years after being arrested for the Pasco shooting, Mendoza was allegedly part of a group that attacked Florentino Jai Castillo, 44, inside the jail.
He is still facing charges in connection with that attack.
Walmart parking lot
Mendoza admitted to being one of four people who got into a white, four-door sedan and followed a green Honda out of the Walmart parking lot on Road 68.
The two men inside the Honda had walked between two groups involved in a gang-related dispute and attracted the attention of four suspected out-of-town gang members in a white sedan. Neither of the victims had ties to gangs, said investigators.
The suspects in the white car followed the Honda as it was crossing the Interstate 182 bridge. The people in the Honda yelled at the men. The Honda's driver Orfanel Campos-Pineda tried to outrun them, leading to a high-speed chase.
Mendoza allegedly leaned out of the passenger window and shot Campos-Pineda four times — once in the face and three times in the upper left chest — one bullet missed his heart by inches.
The suspects sped away, but Mendoza and another man were arrested 20 hours later when they reappeared at Walmart.
Campos-Pineda later told police he was trying to outrun the other car but ended up crashing after he was shot. He was 20 at the time and was hospitalized and required several lengthy surgeries. His friend was not seriously injured.
The three other men in the car with Mendoza already have been sentenced to prison for their roles.
The driver, Esmeralda Cabrera-Castro, and other passengers Ricardo Munoz Estrada and Luis A. Hurtado Diaz pleaded guilty to attempted second-degree murder.
Cabrera-Castro of Moses Lake and Munoz Estrada of Quincy are doing seven years and eight months in prison.
Hurtado Diaz, of George, Wash., was 16 at the time but was sentenced as an adult in July 2020 to similar prison term.
