An Oregon ex-con was ordered to serve 25 years in prison after fatally stabbing a romantic rival in the heart during a jealous attack, prosecutors said.
Eliazar Martinez-Rodriguez, 35, was sentenced on Tuesday, September 15, for killing Jefferson Smith Cates, according to the Clackamas County District Attorney’s Office.
The defendant was ordered to serve 19 years and two months for killing Cates in 2024, prosecutors said.
Martinez-Rodriguez received an additional five years and 10 months for beating a jail inmate after his arrest in the killing, according to the district attorney’s office.
The ex-con pleaded guilty to first-degree manslaughter in Cates’ death, according to prosecutors. He also pleaded guilty to second-degree assault over the jailhouse beating, the office said.
The fatal stabbing was “motivated by jealousy” after both men were romantically involved with the same woman, according to prosecutors.
Martinez-Rodriguez would sometimes stay with the woman at her Clackamas apartment, prosecutors said.
At first, the defendant did not know the woman “also had been intimate with Cates,” according to the district attorney’s office. Martinez-Rodriguez eventually discovered the romantic relationship and became furious, prosecutors said.
On June 22, 2024, Cates and the woman arrived at her apartment together, according to prosecutors.
Martinez-Rodriguez was already at the residence when they got there, prosecutors said.
Cates grew “unnerved” by Martinez-Rodriguez and left the woman’s apartment to get away, according to the district attorney’s office.
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Martinez-Rodriguez found Cates at another location at the apartment complex and stabbed him, prosecutors said.
The blade struck Cates directly in the heart, according to prosecutors.
Witnesses reported that they heard Cates scream during the attack, prosecutors said.
Cates managed to reach an acquaintance’s apartment after being stabbed, prosecutors said. He died there from the wound, the office said.
Cates died at age 30, according to the district attorney’s office.
The defendant carried out the jailhouse beating in May in an alleged unprovoked attack on an inmate, prosecutors said.
When Martinez-Rodriguez killed Cates, he was on supervised release following a federal prison sentence in a firearms case, according to prosecutors.
The convict had violated the conditions of his release and was arrested, prosecutors said. A federal judge nonetheless decided against detaining him over the violation, according to the district attorney’s office.
“I carry Jefferson’s ashes with me every day, but you carry his blood on your hands,” Cates’ mother, Lynette Brunson, told Martinez-Rodriguez at sentencing.
“The violent and vicious manner in which Mr. Martinez-Rodriguez murdered Jefferson by stabbing him in the heart … caused me to have recurring nightmares resulting in high blood pressure, a stroke and heart damage called takosubo cardiomyopathy … nicknamed ‘broken-heart syndrome,’” Brunson said.
“Because that is exactly what Mr. Martinez-Rodriguez has done, breaking not only my heart, but the hearts of everyone who knew and loved Jefferson,” Brunson added.
The federal judge’s choice “to let Mr. Martinez-Rodriguez out of custody literally haunts me,” Brunson said.
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