3 people arrested for involvement in Tempe man’s shooting death

TEMPE, AZ (3TV/CBS 5) -- Police say two men and a woman are facing charges for their involvement in the death of a Tempe man last week. On Thursday, police arrested 30-year-old Amber Cruz, 21-year-old Raymon Gary Pamplin and 28-year-old Phillip Harold Williams.

On May 12, just before 7 p.m., Tempe police were called to a shooting at an apartment near 16th Street and University Drive. Officers arrived and found bullet holes covering the front door and saw two men inside. One man was shot several times, while the other wasn’t hurt, police said. Court documents say officers asked the victim who may have committed the crime, and he said his ex-girlfriend, Cruz. He then told police his ex-girlfriend didn’t shoot him, but her friends did, investigators said. He was taken to the hospital, where he later died. His name hasn’t been released.

The unharmed man told officers he was in the bathroom when he heard loud banging at the door, and then gunshots rang out, police said. He found the victim shot and called 911. Then, officers spoke to a second witness, a friend of the victim. Court documents say the witness believed Cruz shot the victim because the night before the shooting, he had heard the two arguing on the phone, and Cruz told her ex-boyfriend “she was going to send people to come shoot him.”

As officers watched surveillance video of the area, they found a Jeep Wrangler and Ford Fusion pulling up to the apartment complex. Then, another clip shows the sedan speeding out of the parking lot while a man quickly ran into the Jeep Wrangler and took off, investigators said. Call records also show Cruz called Williams, and Williams called Pamplin minutes after the murder, court paperwork states.

Officers began searching through Cruz’s social media accounts and found she had been talking to Williams about the murder the day after the crime, investigators said. Police then linked the Jeep Wrangler to Williams after discovering photos of it on his social media. Investigators also found Williams and Pamplin knew each other, and Pamplin reportedly had a picture on his social media of the sedan involved in the crime.

On Thursday, officers took Pamplin and Williams into custody at different Tempe apartments, and Cruz was found at a Phoenix complex. Police found Pamplin had a gun on him at the time of his arrest, officers said. Both men refused to speak to police. Cruz denied being involved in the shooting and said she didn’t know anything about it, investigators said. All three were booked on one count of premeditated first-degree murder and one count of conspiracy.

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