Long sentence for fatal Tacoma stabbing that was allegedly part of a gang initiation

A fatal Tacoma stabbing landed one of the men involved a hefty prison sentence Friday.

Juan Jose Gaitan Vasquez pleaded guilty to first-degree murder for the death, which was allegedly part of another suspect’s gang initiation.

Pierce County Superior Court Judge Jerry Costello sentenced the 28-year-old to 37 years in prison.

That exceptional sentence — more than eight years above the high-end of Gaitan Vasquez’s standard sentencing range — is what both the defense and prosecution recommended.

Gaitan Vasquez’s plea statement says that he and others, whom he would not identify, lured 25-year-old Samuel Cruces Vasquez to Tacoma on April 28, 2016.

Then Gaitan Vasquez and someone else got into Cruces Vasquez’s car, stabbed him to death and fled.

“Others involved in the conspiracy were outside the car and were there ready and willing to assist as need be,” the statement says.

All were gang members, or sought to be, Gaitan Vasquez said.

Others charged for the stabbing include 31-year-old Cesar Chicas Carballo and 26-year-old Jose Jonael Ayala Reyes, who await trial, and 24-year-old Edenilson Misael Alfaro, who is in custody in California in connection to a different homicide.

According to charging papers:

Cruces Vasquez left his restaurant job at Southcenter Mall to get drinks with a friend.

About an hour later he was found with stab wounds in the 7800 block of South Trafton Street and apparently had been run over.

He died from his injuries at Tacoma General Hospital.

Ayala Reyes was the other man in the car and said he stabbed Cruces Vasquez, a friend, as part of a gang initiation.

He told investigators that he stabbed Cruces Vasquez in the leg but not anywhere else. Later, he said he wasn’t part of the killing.

The Pierce County Medical Examiner said Cruces Vasquez died from multiple stab wounds and blunt-force trauma.