UPDATED on 9/17 at 3:38p.m.
MONTGOMERY COUNTY, Pa. (KYW Newsradio) — The fate of the man accused of putting a Lower Merion home invasion in motion is in the hands of a Montgomery County jury.
Jeremy Fuentes, 27, is charged with second-degree murder, accused of being part of a gun trafficking ring with two men convicted of breaking into a home on Meredith Road in Wynnewood around 2 a.m. on Dec. 9. The men killed 25-year-old Andrew Gaudio and shot and injured his mother.
Prosecutors wrapped up their case with text messages and phone calls between Fuentes and Charles Fulforth, the accused head of the gun trafficking ring and Fuentes’ co-worker at a junk removal company.
Montgomery County First Assistant DA Ed McCann told jurors during closing arguments that 25-year-old Andrew Gaudio is dead, and his mother, Bernadette Gaudio, is paralyzed from the neck down because Fuentes “put a target on their backs.”
McCann said that makes him guilty of Second Degree Murder, even though he wasn’t at the Gaudio’s home when they were shot during the home invasion.
Prosecutors said that on Dec. 6, just days before the murder, Fuentes went to an elderly couple’s home in Bucks County to give an estimate as part of his job at Junk Luggers in Willow Grove, and called his co-worker Charles Fulforth after seeing a large gun safe in the basement.
The next day, after meeting with Fuentes, Fulforth texted another co-worker, Kelvin Roberts, telling him about the home, saying he got information about “two old people with a whole lotta guns.”
Jurors also heard from the victim’s mother on the trial’s second day.
Testifying on Tuesday from her wheelchair as an aide wiped tears from her eyes, Bernadette Gaudio said she woke up on Dec. 9 to the gunshot that ripped through her neck and shattered her vertebrae, paralyzing her.
She said she heard her son call to her as he ran down the hallway of their home on Meredith Road in Wynnewood, before he was shot and killed on the floor of her bedroom.
Prosecutor Brianna Ringwood told jurors during opening statements Monday that under the law, Fuentes is guilty of second-degree murder, even if he wasn’t at the scene, because she said Fuentes agreed to and helped plan the burglary that resulted in Gaudio’s death.
Ringwood said Fuentes and Fulforth were part of a gun trafficking ring, and Fuentes saw an opportunity to make money.
Fulforth and Roberts confused the address and ended up on Meredith Road in Wynnewood rather than Meredith Drive in Bucks County. They were both convicted of first-degree murder in July.
Fuentes’ lawyer, Matt Quigg, argued prosecutors are “spinning and twisting evidence into something it’s not.” Quigg argued Fulforth was using and controlling Fuentes, getting the information he needed to commit the robbery without Fuentes’ knowledge.
Second-degree murder carries a mandatory life sentence, but Fuentes’s lawyer told jurors there is no evidence showing Fuentes agreed to, helped plan, or even knew about the home invasion until several days later.
Quigg said if Fuentes was overseeing the plans, he would have corrected Fulforth when Fulforth said the home was in Lower Merion instead of Bucks County.