Robert Fry is a serial killer from Farmington, New Mexico, convicted of four murders committed in San Juan County between 1996 and 2000. He was sentenced to death for one of those killings and to life in prison for the other three. In 2019, the New Mexico Supreme Court vacated his death sentence, and he is now serving life plus 120 years with no realistic prospect of release.
The Four Murders
Joseph Fleming and Matthew Trecker, 1996
On Thanksgiving night, November 29, 1996, Fry and two accomplices, Harold Pollock and Leslie Engh, entered a counterculture shop called the Eclectic in downtown Farmington. Fry killed 25-year-old Joseph Fleming and 18-year-old Matthew Trecker, both employees. The two men were beaten and had their throats cut. Prosecutors said the killings were committed to eliminate witnesses to a burglary of the store.1KRQE. Killer Walks Halls as Execution Stalled
Donald Tsosie, 1998
On April 1, 1998, Fry and Engh encountered Donald Tsosie, a 40-year-old Navajo man from Ganado, Arizona, near a bar on Main Street in Farmington. They offered him a ride and drove him to a remote area near the Arizona border. There, they beat and robbed him, struck him with a shovel and a broomstick, choked him with a belt, stabbed him, and shoved his body off a cliff roughly 30 feet high. Tsosie’s body was found in Head Canyon on April 29, 1998. Investigators said the killing appeared to have no motive beyond robbery and the violence itself.1KRQE. Killer Walks Halls as Execution Stalled2Indian Country Today. Racism a Possible Issue in Reservation Bordertown Murders
Betty Lee, 2000
On June 9, 2000, Fry and Engh came across Betty Lee, a 36-year-old Diné College student and mother, at a Farmington convenience store. She was crying and stranded. Fry offered her a ride, then drove to an isolated dirt road near a ravine. He stabbed Lee in the chest with an eight-inch Bowie knife. When she pulled the knife from her body and tried to escape, Fry retrieved a ten-pound sledgehammer from his car and struck her repeatedly in the back of the head, killing her.1KRQE. Killer Walks Halls as Execution Stalled3FindLaw. State v. Fry, No. 27,592
The physical evidence against Fry was overwhelming. Lee’s blood was found on the knife, the sledgehammer, Fry’s car, his clothing, his boots, and a flashlight in his vehicle. DNA analysis confirmed the match. Tire tracks at the scene matched his car, and boots recovered from his home matched shoe impressions at the crime scene. One of Lee’s earrings was found inside his vehicle. Blood spatter analysis showed that the stains on Fry’s clothing were consistent with someone leaning over a victim and striking her with a blunt instrument, while Engh’s shoes showed only low-velocity transfer stains, indicating he had not delivered the blows.3FindLaw. State v. Fry, No. 27,592
Other Incidents
On September 2, 1997, between the first murders and the second, Fry terrorized a woman named Rhonda Knott with a gun. She escaped. Available records do not clearly show whether charges were filed.4Radford University. Fry, Robert – Serial Killer Case Study Fry was also suspected in the May 29, 1998 death of 22-year-old Pernell Tewangonitewa, though he was never charged. A San Juan County sheriff’s sergeant later told reporters that two other people who had gone missing in the county were known to Fry and that he could not be ruled out as a suspect in their disappearances.5KOAT. Death Row Inmate Found Guilty of 1996 Double Murder
Arrests and Convictions
Fry and Engh were arrested on June 11, 2000, two days after Betty Lee’s body was found. Investigators obtained a lengthy recorded video interrogation of Engh describing the murders and Fry’s role. Engh pleaded guilty to first-degree murder and kidnapping, testified against Fry, and was sentenced to two life terms plus 10 years.1KRQE. Killer Walks Halls as Execution Stalled6Indian Country Today. Leslie Engh Sentenced Pollock was prosecuted as an accessory in the Fleming and Trecker killings and received a life sentence.7Corrections1. NM High Court to Hear Convicted Murderer’s Appeal
Fry’s trials proceeded in reverse chronological order of the murders.
On April 18, 2001, a jury convicted him of first-degree murder, kidnapping, attempted criminal sexual penetration, and tampering with evidence in the killing of Betty Lee. The jury found that the murder was committed with intent to kill during a kidnapping and sentenced Fry to death.3FindLaw. State v. Fry, No. 27,592
In September 2003, a separate jury convicted Fry of murdering Donald Tsosie but opted against the death penalty, sentencing him to life. That jury was not told of his existing death sentence.8Indianz.com. Jury Convicts Farmington Man for Navajo Murder
In the fall of 2004, Fry was convicted of the double murder of Joseph Fleming and Matthew Trecker and received two consecutive life sentences. Pollock refused to testify at this trial, and the judge allowed prosecutors to read his earlier preliminary hearing testimony into the record.7Corrections1. NM High Court to Hear Convicted Murderer’s Appeal5KOAT. Death Row Inmate Found Guilty of 1996 Double Murder
In total, Fry received one death sentence and three life sentences. Prosecutors described the crimes as disorganized thrill killings, noting that he often used weapons available at the scene, left bodies where they fell, and killed without clear motive.1KRQE. Killer Walks Halls as Execution Stalled
How Fry Came Off Death Row
The New Mexico Supreme Court affirmed Fry’s conviction and death sentence on December 8, 2005.3FindLaw. State v. Fry, No. 27,592 Four years later, the state legislature repealed the death penalty and substituted life without parole for future capital cases. The repeal applied only to offenses committed after July 1, 2009, and was not retroactive.9Bureau of Justice Statistics. Capital Punishment, 2009 – Statistical Tables That left Fry and one other inmate, Timothy Allen, as the only two men still under active death sentences in New Mexico.
Fry’s attorney, Kathleen McGarry, challenged the sentence as arbitrary and disproportionate when measured against other New Mexico murder cases. She told the justices that cases “far worse than Mr. Fry’s case” had not resulted in death sentences. The state argued the court should stay with a narrower 1983 standard limiting comparison to cases with similar aggravating circumstances.10Death Penalty Information Center. New Mexico Supreme Court Hears Argument on Whether State May Execute Last Two Men on Its Death Row11KRQE. New Mexico High Court Eyes Whether Inmates Can Be Executed During argument, Justice Charles Daniels noted that between 1979 and 2009, prosecutors sought the death penalty more than 200 times in New Mexico, but juries imposed it in only 15 cases, and the state had carried out only one execution — Terry Clark, in 2001 — in 57 years.
On June 28, 2019, in the consolidated case Fry v. Lopez, the New Mexico Supreme Court vacated both death sentences in a 3-2 decision. Writing for the majority, Justice Barbara J. Vigil held that the sentences were “excessive or disproportionate” under a 1979 state law requiring comparative proportionality review. The court found “no meaningful distinction” between Fry’s and Allen’s cases and other equally brutal murders where the death penalty had not been imposed. It abandoned the narrower 1983 framework from State v. Garcia, calling it “insufficient to eliminate the possibility of an arbitrary and capricious sentence,” and cited the 2009 legislative repeal as evidence that the death penalty had become “a relative nullity” in New Mexico.12FindLaw. Fry v. Lopez, Nos. S-1-SC-34372, S-1-SC-34386
The court did not reach constitutional grounds. It remanded both cases to the San Juan County District Court with instructions to impose sentences of life imprisonment. Chief Justice Judith K. Nakamura dissented, joined by retired Justice Petra Jimenez Maes, arguing that the majority had effectively done what the legislature chose not to do: repeal the death penalty retroactively.13New Mexico Courts. Supreme Court Vacates Death Sentences of the Last Inmates on Death Row The ruling emptied New Mexico’s death row.14Death Penalty Information Center. New Mexico – State Information
Where Fry Is Now
Fry’s death sentence for Betty Lee’s murder was replaced by life imprisonment. He remains in the New Mexico prison system. As Justice Edward L. Chávez noted in a concurring opinion, a life sentence technically carries the possibility of parole after 30 years, but Fry faces an additional 120 years from his three other first-degree murder convictions, which makes release a practical impossibility. He was 45 at the time of the 2019 ruling.13New Mexico Courts. Supreme Court Vacates Death Sentences of the Last Inmates on Death Row